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comeandreadawhile · 3 years

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Clone Social Media : Hobbies

The phenomenon starts with the intention to show the civilians of the Republic the men behind the armor, as well as an encouragement for the men to do the things they enjoy when they have the time to in lieu of sitting around cleaning weapons for a third time that day.

Scratch that—the phenomenon starts with High General Kenobi, on a rare day of leave, teaching his Marshal Commander how to bake. Said Commander’s men were happy to taste test the flurry of experimental confections that pervaded their leave days in the following months. News spread fast of Marshal Commander Cody having a knack for baking, and so followed the spread of troopers attempting to make their own treats and/or branching off into other things the civilians called “hobbies” whenever what they could get their hands on afforded them.

The phenomenon kicked off when Padawan Commander Tano began a social media account with the intention of using it as a public diary, her first post was a picture taken of some of the 501st—with permission, her caption says—as they went about retouching paint scuffed in their most recent battle. The men are relaxed, some with paint smeared on their hands and cheeks and seemingly reacting to some joke or story told outside the threshold of the camera, and it’s an almost startling difference from the image of rigid lines of men, faceless in their full kits of white plastoid, that the civilians are used to. Tano’s second post is a video clip of one Captain Rex, with one General Skywalker sitting on his back counting reps, doing push-ups; the video was captioned “Another day in the G.A.R., restless in hyperspace.”

The digital diary continues from there, videos and pictures of specific locations posted only after reaching a safe distance to do so, never sharing anything mission critical—past, current, or hypothetical future. Eventually she shows the men under her how to make their own accounts, and other Jedi and their own troops follow suit. The 212th then takes it upon themselves to post pictures of the little cakes their Marshal Commander has gotten so proficient at making, and, when General Kenobi creates a joint account titled “command_212”, convince Cody to post pictures of things he bakes before they are distributed—even in the process of baking, if the fancy strikes him.

So Marshal Commander Cody shares pictures of his experiments, of recipes he finds that turned out well, of recipes that didn’t because of some error or other that he’s determined to give another go, with the occasional cryptid picture of General Kenobi taking his tea in the barrack’s kitchen. As time goes on those pictures shift to Obi-Wan covered in flour, or a shot taken from several feet away of Cody sneaking batter captioned “caught red-handed in the red velvet”.

As Marshal Commander of the 212th has taken to baking to relieve stress, the Commander of the 104th has turned to needlecraft and yarnwork.

The 104th retaliate the populatrity of the 212th’s command account with the domesticity of their own, despite the vaguely threatening possibilities of knitting and sewing needles. Boost and Sinker run the majority of the account, although all OG members of the 104th have access to it; they post pictures of the things Wolffe makes them, of General Plo covered in the lengths of scarves he’s received, of Comet in the ever-growing swath the gifted blankets with the current tally in the caption (his toes were off the floor by blanket burrito 6). The holonet at large loves Plo almost as much as his men, and once a week they post him saying some piece of sage wisdom—or utter nonsense, as the mood strikes—as the war goes on. After months of asking for a face reveal and requests for the patterns people are sure Wolffe uses, they make the most Force-forsaken tutorial videos as an all-in-one series.

“HOLY **** HE’S CASTING ON 12 TO START—“ “WHAT A MAD MAN!”

“So when you get to this row here you’re going to knit 3, purl 3–“ “TRANSCENDENT!” “—yes, thank you, and then keep doing that until you reach the end of the row...”

“Oh, OH MAN HE’S GONNA DO IT!” “HE’S GONNA CHANGE COLORS!” “Holy **** man he’s gonNA YOOOOOOOOOO!”

Cody is then issued a challenge by the holonet to learn to knit. He learns to crochet. Because Obi-Wan knows how to crochet. The holonet loves video snippets of them progressing on projects together. They also love the videos Ahsoka posts of Cody attempting to teach Rex, and praise the absolutely completely unrelated hat she later posts a picture of; it covers her Montrals with enough room for a few years’ growth. Anakin gets yarn stuck in his mechanical hand because he forgot to put his glove on before attempting to craft.

The real throwdown happens when the account for the Coruscant Guard posts videos of Fox aggressively tatting while venting about the lack of funding for proper security and surveillance tech.

Each posts sees a comical increase in the surfaces covered in lace doilies and runners, as well as a new topic for Fox’s venting.

A picture of an pillow embroidered with “Kriff the Seppies” is briefly posted to the 104th’s account before being taken down and replaced with a censor bar. Rumors begin to circulate when Senator Chuchi posts a picture wearing a gifted lace shawl; Senator Amidala comments on her confusion being resolved as to why Riyo kept bringing little baskets of crochet thread with her before a senate meetings.

A competition for ship nose art starts up, many votes going to the 501st, and the holonet’s heart once again melting at “Plo’s Bros”. Personal art begins popping up soon after. Fives starts posting spray paint tutorials, Rex and Hardcase become popular for clean graphic art. Bly gets his hands on metallic paint and the crowds go wild. Kix has taken his clean haircut game to the next level.

And then Colt and Shaak Ti make an account to post art the Littles make, most of them representations of their older brothers with wishes of safety and good luck, and of the only Jedi they’ve ever known, sometimes creatures they studied in their preparation for worlds outside of Kamino. Of batches passing their final tests with a congratulatory post.

Suggestions and instructions are sent out for clones who want to take and sell commissions, allowing them to finally make some money; most Jedi are more than happy to help make sure the finished work mails out properly to the buyers.

Ships of the non-nose art kind surface on the holonet. It’s generally agreed upon that command_212 is run by husbands, and Aayla is the protector of the 327th and Bly’s heart, even if she’s a clumsy menace around his artwork (caf spilled over a drying watercolor can be interesting or terrible depending on the circumstance). No one can agree whether Skywalker is married to his captain or Senator Amidala, but everyone agrees that Ahsoka is their baby. The holonet declares Plo to have Big Dad Energy. Shaak Ti’s Big Mom Energy is a friendly rival. The Jedi council has made no official statement denying or denouncing these attachments.

Public interest begins to shift from producing more soldiers to making sure the ones the Republic has stay alive, when the realization hits that within a couple of years the children posting art and losing teeth would probably be losing blood and brothers on some far away planet. Of making sure the men are eating well instead of just surviving. Well certain account-holders don’t post for a while, grieving a loss, posting again to reassure their followers they’re alright, the public questions what’s being done to keep the men emotionally and mentally well outside of the hobbies the public knows them for. “Born to handle any stress” is very much the wrong answer.

Pressure is put on the Chancellor to let the Separatists sucede, no one quite sure anymore why allowing them to would be harmful when at worst new trade agreements would need to be brokered; if they want to leave so badly, let them. And let the men have their hobbies.

(Sad thoughts ahead)

Sometimes commissioners never receive their orders, simply a refund with a letter from that clone’s Jedi after the latest battle ends. Any money they’d made would be split however their closest brothers decide.

The channel that always posts pranks and spray paint tutorials makes a post saying they’d be away to look after their sick little brother. It’s the last post they make.

The Coruscant Guard’s account stops posting a few nights later.

After Order 66 goes out, a new account goes up posting any pictures and cute videos of Aayla. Reposting old ones that the public is sure they’d seen somewhere before, posting new ones of funny faces and ridiculous videos of silly dances. The last one is the only one captioned, “she wasn’t a traitor.”

The account is deleted the same night, and the one of the 327th’s adventures never posts again.

Wolfpack_104 does not post, but is still there.

Command_212 is deleted almost immediately the night of the order.

Years go by, almost sixteen, and only after Vader already knows she’s alive does Ahsoka post again. It’s a picture of her, and Rex and Wolffe onboard the Ghost in hyperspace captioned “Was never a traitor. Always the little sister even if I’m four years older. In case you’re wondering, Rex still draws and Wolffe still knits when we can nab the string and flimsi.”

#star wars #the clone wars #codywan #blyla #implied #foxiyo #rexwalker #commander cody #captain rex #commander wolffe #commander bly #commander colt #obi wan kenobi #anakin skywalker #ahsoka tano #plo koon #shaak ti

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o-wise-corvid · 3 years

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Oooookay guys! Here’s the prologue to my little fic idea. It’s um... it’s gonna be depressing okay so if you can’t handle some gut wrenching emotionals, leave this for another day. I really hope y’all like it and I’m gonna try to get at least one update in a week. Anyhoo. Enjoy.

People who were wanting more: @captainrexisboo @clonetrooperrights @koskareevesismyqueen @gospelofme @jgvfhl @ct-27-fives @pro-fangirls-unsocial-life

TAGS: PG-13 tops/mention of deaths/battle trauma/PTSD/ nightmares/ self-loathing thoughts/ um... If y’all see something else I need to tag, holler. Oh and if ya wanna reblog, go right ahead.

Prologue- Captain Cody

A varactyl death scream. The echoing sounds of blaster fire. His own voice repeated over and over, bellowing orders, shrieking in pain. He watched the Jedi fall. Obi-Wan turned himself over in midair, determined to survive. The commander’s arm was still lifted in the kill order gesture, two fingers pointing at the target. His arm. “Blast him.” Words formed easily by his mouth while the inside of his head screamed, fighting his own bones and muscles.

Cody’s eyes snapped open and he cried out wordlessly, relieved to find himself in his bunk, shrouded in the dark, legs twisted up in sweat damp covers. He lay still, trying to bring his breathing under control.

“Captain?” The black protocol droid that had been assigned to his quarters snapped to life and turned hollow, yellow visual sensors toward him.

“It’s fine, Sixthree.” His voice sounded ragged in the hollow, stuffy echo of the room.

Cody sat up, swinging his legs over the side of his bunk with a groan. His hips and lower back protested, popping as he moved. He was getting old and feeling it. Standing, Cody shuffled to the refresher and braced himself on the little sink that stood directly opposite the door. The squared off, slightly warped mirror betrayed more than his body ever could.

His hair was silvered at the temples and around the back of his head, thinning up top. He’d been considering going totally bald for a while now. Just to be done with it. Wrinkles spread out from his eyes in webs, carving furrows from his nose and down the sides of his mouth, creasing his forehead. The scar framing his left eye was more like a crevice now, pulling his eyelid down a little. His body wasn’t as lithe and flexible as it had once been, though he’d like to see one of the fit new Shinies take on a spider droid up next to him.

“You look rough, Trooper.” And then he smiled dryly at himself, scratching the stubble on his chin and cheeks absently.

A sick ache left from the dream curdled in his guts and he splashed some lukewarm water on his face. The memories of the Order didn’t seem like they would ever ease. The hatred of what he’d done followed him like a shadow, literally everywhere he looked, the result of his contribution to the Galactic Empire slapped him across the face as if on purpose. The monster had risen from the seeds sown by what most people now called The Clone Wars and it was huge, dark and ugly.

Obi-Wan. Cody gave an audible hiss at the thought of his name. The Jedi had been his friend, had saved his life, and how had he been repaid? With a watery grave, a shot in the back from his own Troopers. Guilt, old and familiar made him tighten his grip on the sink, the flimsy plastisteel groaning under the force he exerted. There’d not been a man in he galaxy that Cody had respected more and a faint glimmer of hope that his actions now would’ve made The Negotiator... what, proud? Not hate him because of what he’d done, the way he did in many other nightmares that made the regular circuit of his fitful dreams.

Cody wasn’t sure. He walked around, issued order about keeping the destroyer he’d been charged with floating, and trained new recruits when he wasn’t looking fierce. Recruits?! Stupid little kids that thought they could ever match the ferocity and skill of Clones. His brothers. There were so few of them left anymore, all spread around, trying to imprint their abilities on people who were not bread to war and battle. It was such numb-skulled concept. The Empire wanted the effectiveness of Clones but didn’t want to keep making them.

“Captain Cody.”

That voice brought him to attention. It was Vader. A chill crept over his scalp and down his spine until it sank into his feet, turning them into blocks of ice. Cody crossed to the communication display that took up most of the living quarter’s space. Vader’s head and shoulders loomed, huge and eclipsing, angular mask staring at him indifferently. He snapped to attention, uncaring that he was only in the black bottoms that he wore under his armor. “Lord Vader.”

The head inclined slightly in acknowledgement. Just after the end of the Wars, Vader had caught him in this state before and when he didn’t address the fact that Cody was naked to the waist and obviously just getting out of bed, Cody realized that Vader either tolerated it, doubtful, or simply didn’t care. He had no idea who Vader was underneath the armor and cape, but his suspicions leant toward a former Jedi. Who in the Force that might’ve been, he had absolutely no clue. The man knew soldiers though and he didn’t antagonize those who did their job and did it well. One thing he knew though was that he didn’t want to get on Vader’s bad side. Cody had betrayed his Jedi against his will, but this man... this man was something else. If former Jedi he was, Vader had slain and hunted his brethren until the mention of them was all but forbidden. If he knew soldiers, then he’d been in command. And there were only a handful of Jedi who had actually led troops, none of whom Cody could stomach the thought of becoming the beast that was Darth Vader.

“Your presence is required in the training yard. I have a new assignment for you.”

“As you wish, my Lord.” Cody answered automatically, without inflection. It was the way a Clone still under the control of the chip would sound like and Cody was careful to hold himself in that tight pattern, not allowing the facade to slip for even a second. If they knew, if anyone so much as suspected...

But his life was cheap at this point and if he had to die, trying to keep an eye on the Empire was a good use of what little time he had left.

He dressed quickly after Vader ended the transmission. His armor was not dissimilar from that which he’d worn nearly all his life, except black was the main color rather than white. It did look nicer, the shiny plastoid gleaming darkly with his signature bright yellow-gold accents. He bore the rank of Captain now, which was more decorative than anything, but even after all these years, Cody felt most comfortable with the weight of his armor encapsulating him. The Imperial insignia across his chest soured that comfortable feeling though.

Vader was waiting for him in the training yard, a thrumming shadow with the breath of a sleeping giant, waiting to reach out and crush anything it decided deserved a slow, strangling death. He was well over six feet tall and made Cody feel like he was looking up into the mouth of some enraged, ravenous beast. But he snapped to, saluted and stood at attention with practiced and even graceful fluidity.

“Captain,” Vader greeted smoothly, stepping to the side. His long cape shifted to reveal a... little girl? Cody’s eyes flicked down at her, seeing the naked terror on her face and it was all he could do not to tilt his head to let her know he was looking at her.

“This child is a force wielder, Captain. She lacks the ability to become as powerful as myself or even as the Jedi who you once served beside, but her talents can be used for the Empire’s service. You will train her in hand to hand combat. Your service record reflects the type of master she will require to be of use to us.”

“Yes sir,” Cody chirped, hoping his voice didn’t betray his total shock at what was happening. “She will... stay with me?”

“She will stay wherever you deem fit. Do not coddle her, Captain.” The command dripped menace and Cody fought the urge to swallow nervously.

“Of course not, my Lord. She will learn or she will die.” The little girl flinched at the word, glancing between the two faceless men. Vader nodded pointedly and left, the cape billowing behind him like a storm, not sparing a further considering moment for the little girl.

“Follow me.” Cody made sure his voice carried an acidic growl loud enough for anyone within earshot to register.

The girl gave a start and then obeyed. Her eyes were huge and dark, dirty and tangled black curls spilling around her face. Her skin would’ve been dark, possibly the same shade as his, had she not been leeched with cold and fright, her hands balled into tight little fists that she kept pressed to her chest.

He led her to his quarters, unsure of where else he was even supposed to take her. No one so much as glanced at them as the odd duo passed through the monstrous ship and Cody wondered if it was out of fear or apathy. Once they were inside, Cody ordered the protocol droid to go find some clothes that would fit the girl and bring in some food for her. The chattery clanker hurried off to do his bidding and Cody locked the door behind it. Then, he turned to look at the little girl.

What was he supposed to do now? Training older teenagers and grown adults was one thing. But a kid? A kid who’d been ripped from her family and tossed on a Star Destroyer with an old Clone, no less. Where was she from? What had happened to her? What must be happening inside her head right now...

“What’s your name?”

She blinked up at him, fear and anger making her eyes over bright, not answering. Instead, she made a frightened little noise and stepped back from him, glancing around for somewhere to escape. She was so scared, so lost. The sight of her did something unspeakable to Cody’s heart and he fought the urge to just scoop her up and hold her. Kids shouldn’t be experiencing this. They should be at home, with family, with people who could provide for them and protect them. This was so wrong. So cruel.

“Hey, hey, no...” Cody hesitated and then slowly removed his helmet, remembering an incident with Waxer and Boil on Ryloth in what felt like another lifetime. The helmets were scary back then; he probably looked like some sort of predator to her. Sinking down on one knee slowly, he leveled his eyes with hers, hoping not to further terrify his new charge. “I’m Cody. I’m not gonna hurt you, little one. But if you’re gonna survive this, you’re gonna have to trust me.”

She stared at him, breathing hard. There was no way he could get her off the ship and back to safety; her home was probably a crater by now, wherever it was.

“I... come here.” He reached for the blanket crumpled on his bed and tugged it free. “I know it’s cold. You’ll get used to it. Especially once we get you some decent clothes.” He opened it up to her, inviting her to take it. She didn’t. The dark, wide eyes watched him, tears spilling over and down her cheeks. Cody didn’t expect to feel a lump form in his own throat but there it was.

And that was when the world of Trooper CC-2224 shifted.

Something clicked, almost audibly, inside Cody’s head and the running, yowling script of “How am I supposed to do this?” halted, erased itself and was replaced with one firm sentence: “I’m going to do this.” Because of course he was. There wasn’t another option. He might’ve betrayed the Jedi, he might be still serving the Empire despite having slowly but surely shrugged out from under the control of the chip in his brain, but he was not going to just allow this little girl to suffer if he could possibly help it. For all his failings, for all his regret and self-hatred, this little girl could be the one thing that he finally got right. She needed a family, a protector, a provider... well... she had one. If this was coddling, then he guessed he’d just have to make his peace with disobeying a direct order, come what may. There really wasn’t any other choice.

“It’s okay, precious. I’m not-“ His breath left him as the girl flung herself at him. He wondered for a split second if maybe his epiphany had somehow shown through on his face as the girl’s momentum sent him rocking backward a little. It didn’t really matter though. This was where he realized he wanted her, safe and wrapped up in his arms. The relief of being able to comfort her somehow bled the strength out of him like a wound and he sat down with a weary sigh.

Skinny arms clutched around his neck and the cries of a child who had seen and felt too much too soon tore the air the quiet room. They stabbed at his chest, sounding too much like the green varactyl as it had fallen. “Easy, easy,” Cody tried, eyes stinging. He let the little girl cling to him as hard as she wanted, rubbing her bony back soothingly. He wanted to say something, to find the magic word that would make the pain that was this small creature lessen. But there were none, he realized as he swiped angrily at his own wet cheeks.

“You’re gonna have to trust me, okay?” he repeated after a long minute, having wrestled his emotions down to where he thought he could keep them still. “You’re gonna be okay.” Whatever was going to happen with this little girl would not be easy but in no way was this something he’d miss. Toss her off on some underling? Step in to check on her once a week? Unthinkable.

She grew still and then stepped back a little bit, hands still on his shoulders. Swollen, red eyes. Streaked, grimy cheeks. A dress that was mostly patches and frayed edges. “Cody,” she tried, and managed a wobbling, watery smile.

He smiled sadly at her, wiping her tears away with his thumbs. “That’s right. You... you can either tell me your name or if you’d like, you can have a new one.” What made him do it, Cody wouldn’t be able to say for several years. But the ultimate reason was that this little creature reminded him so very much of his brothers. He’d never held someone, let them cry on him and felt their body heave with sorrow, that wasn’t one of his brothers.

“I can pick a name?” A curious, almost happy note crept into the girl’s voice, which was high and sweet.

“Sure. I picked mine.”

She frowned but it was more curiosity instead of something troubling. A grimy hand came up and dug the heel of her palm into her eyes, then she gave a loud sniffle. “Your parents didn’t give you one?”

“I didn’t have parents,” Cody said simply. “I had brothers though. Lots and lots of them.”

The girl’s face brightened but then fell. “My parents are gone, too.”

“I’m sorry, sweetheart.” Cody cupped her face in his hands, trying so hard to be gentle. “But you’ve got me. I’m gonna make sure you’re gonna be okay.”

Her eyes glistened but she didn’t start sobbing again. Instead, she reached up and traced the curve of Cody’s scar with one finger. If there had been some part of himself that Cody had been withholding from committing to keeping this girl alive, it was now officially and unconditionally surrendered. He expected her to say something about the scar, but instead she asked softly, “Could I have my Mama’s name?”

“Tell it to me.” He actually impressed himself with how steady his voice sounded because inside, everything felt like it was breaking and twisting, reshaping itself into something not unpleasant but not easily made.

“Gaia,” she said quietly.

“That’s lovely.” Cody smiled, a tear that he hadn’t watched closely enough slipping down his cheek. The little girl saw it and daintily brushed it away. “You sure about it?” he asked, clearing his throat to try to hold some part of himself together.

“... Yeah...”

He pulled her into another hug, which was warmer than the first. She curled into him like they’d known one another her whole life and Cody, now so exhausted that all he wanted to do was crawl into bed and never get up, leaned back against the wall with a tired grunt. “Okay, Gaia. Okay.”

#star wars #sunshine squad #commander cody #star wars fanfiction #the clone wars #temura morrison #gaia #darth vader #latent Mandalorian parenting syndrome

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anileahvictoria · 3 years

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Adam Kendall from My Little House on the Prairie.

Cutie Mark: Adam has always had a fascination with law and thought about becoming a lawyer many times, but ultimately decides he could do more good as a teacher for the blind. His cutie mark was inspired by the saying that justice is blind, so the scales of justice represent balancing his love for the study of law with his responsibilities as a teacher, and husband, and the cloth is Lady Justice’s eye covering that makes her blind, just like Adam is.

I accidentally referred to Little House on the Prairie as My Little House on the Prairie, and this fan art was born. More on that later, It's time for a rant. Adam is my favorite character from the series until I got mad and left the fandom cause they did this beautiful man dirty, so It’s time to rant about it.

#1. The Romance. The romance between Mary and adam was totally out of the blue. When Merry goes blind, she's shipped off to blind school, and her teacher is this capable, intelligent and hard-working young man named Adam Kendal. His teaching still is very much tough love, and he doesn't take crap from his students. Mary starts as a reluctant, uncooperative, self-pitying, closed-minded student doing things like throwing her things across the room. Adam handles all this brilliantly, saying stuff like: if you're gonna make a mess, your gonna clean it up. Doesn't baby her or pitty her AT ALL. Exactly what she needs. After a few months, Mary's attitude changes drastically, and she's thriving thanks to Adam. But when Adam sits her down to teach her some piano, she has a moment of self-doubt:

Merry: I could never learn...

Adam: I wish you would forget about that. Some of the greatest writers and composers in the worl were blind.Have you ever heard of John Milton?

Merry: Well of course. He- he wrote Paradise Lost, one of my favorite books.

Adam: Well, he was also blind. Now, do you want to play the piano or not?

Merry: There wouldn't be enough time. You know my family's coming to take me home. They'll be here in a few days.

Adam: It's been a long time, hasn't it, since you've seen your folks?

Merry: It seems like a lifetime. Adam, I'm so scared. I mean... I know I'm ready to go home... But here it's- it's easy, and I've always got you to help me.

Adam: Merry, you can't depend on me forever. And I'll be leaving too.

Merry: Where are you going?

Adam: To Winoka, to start a new blind school.

Merry: Why didn't you tell me?

Adam: I don't know. It just never came up.

Merry: Then I'm glad I'm going home.

Adam: Merry, it's not that much different out there. Not really.

And now it gets all angsty:

Merry: Yes, it is. I wouldn't expect you to understand. How could you?

Adam: Mary...

Mary: The world isn't like the Burton school for the blind. It... It's a huge, dark place filled with... hidden obstacles and... strange sounds and voices coming from faceless people. Even you. I've never even seen you.

Adam: Well then look at me.

... And then they start feeling each other's faces and, correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure blind people don't actually do that...

And then it gets randomly and weirdly romantic...

Mary: What color are your eyes?

Adam: Blue.

Mary: Your hair?

Adam: Brown.

Mary: Thank you Adam.

Adam: ...What do you look like, Mary? Ive never seen you either.

Aaaand more face touching.

So apparently, they're a thing now. I'd understand if Adam fell for her cause she looks like a literal angel (seriously, no girl has any business looking that gorgeous), but Adam's blind too. So he's going ultimately off of personality, I'm guessing. And when he first meets Mary, she is not a pleasant person. Yes, she does improve quite a lot, but what makes her any different than all the other students he's taught? It certainly isn't their age, cause Adam's 22 and Mary's 15 (back then, I guess it wasn't a big deal). Also, It creeps me way out that her teacher falls in love with her. The man who spends most hours of the day alone with a vulnerable teenage girl falls in love with said girl AND THEN asks said girl to work for him at his new school in a busy city away from her family where it would just be Adam, Mary, one old man who lives on the top floor, and a few students, not to mention Mary would also be spending the nights there... It's a good thing this isn't that kinda show cause there's a million different ways that could've gone... But because this is Little House on the Prairie, nothing happens, and Adam asks Mary to be his wife soon after she moves in.

#2. Regaining his Sight And Becoming a Lawyer.

This really makes me mad. When Adam gets his sight back and sees the faces of all his friends and, most importantly, his wife for the first time. It's beautiful and wonderful and heaven knows the man deserves a miracle like that, BUT his whole character changes. He goes from a responsible teacher and loving husband who knows who he is and where he's meant to be, to an ambitious young man who would rather chase his dreams of becoming a lawyer than take care of his responsibilities to the school he started, the children he teaches, and the wife he loves. I can understand wanting to go and see the world and do things you couldn't do before, but sighted or blind, he has responsibilities. Mary is kinda left in the dust when Adam makes all these new sighted friends and drags her along to all his fancy lawyer parties while he plays games, runs around laughing and talking, and leaves Mary sitting in a chair all by herself. Like, he doesn't even consider how she must be feeling! He doesn't try to include her in conversations or introduce her to his new friends; she's just a pretty thing that sits there to be cared for. And the thing is, this is exactly what Adam was afraid would happen to him when Mary thought her sight was returning a few episodes ago! Now Adam's new fancy friends get him an opportunity to take some fancy tests to become a lawyer and Adam, without a second thought for Mary, goes off to take the test, not evening considering who would run the school if he passed and became a lawyer. Then some bad stuff happens, and he can't make it to the test, and I'm all relieved cause we all know he belongs with his wife teaching at the school and now he'll see things clearly and get his head off the cloud and onto the here and now. But nooooo, this whole time Mary is hoping he'd fail (and so am I), but when she sees how heartbroken he is, she goes and has a talk with the professor and convinces him to let Adam take the test. He finally relents, and Adam passes and becomes a lawyer, giving the school away to a wonderful woman who teaches there. This whole thing is treated like he made the right choice when he obviously isn't! Not I blame this on the time period the show was made in. Back then, a man had to be ambitious and provide for the family and leave the teaching and such to the woman, so back then, it was a good thing he went off and became a lawyer, but still, I'm mad. Correct me if I'm wrong, but when Adam hands the school over to the lady, Mary no longer teaches there, which means that Adam has taken away Mary's dream of teaching on top of not spending nearly as much time as he used to with her and (though he doesn't realize it and I don't think anyone brings it to his attention cause men are supposed" to do all the work) doesn't let her do things for herself.

#3. He's Fictional.

This one makes me the madest. At first, I turned a blind eye to all these flaws cause I assumed Adam Kendall was based off an actual person, like most characters in the series, but noooo. They made him up just for the tv series. This means his romance with Mary WAS totally random, and Mary staying in the same building as he did BEFORE they were married WAS the writer's choice, and Adam regaining his sight and leaving his wife and school in the dust WAS ALSO THE WRITERS CHOICE! AND he was basically just made to me Mary's husband because Mary doesn't marry or have children in real life. So yeah, my favorite character's development went down the drain. But oh well, that's what we have fanfic and fanart for, am I right? Oh wait, this show is old. No one's made any good fanart/fanfic. K, I'm gonna go cry now. Bye

Also, if anyone has a different opinion or point of view, please tell me about it. I'd love to go back to loving this character, so please change my mind 🥺.

#my little pony #fan art #my little pony fan art #little house on the prairie #little house on the prairie fan art #my little house on the prairie #blind #blind character #character design #adam kendall

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yespolkadotkitty · 4 years

Note

Agh!! Nudie Anon here. I’m open to any Ezra nickname at all!! Thank YOU!

Rainfall

Gorgeous gif by @ithinkwehitametaphor - thankyou! and thanking @mourningbirds1 for the beta read.

Warnings: dark(ish) Ezra, mild violence, swears.

****

“She’s fine, your little bit, ain’t she? Seen her somewhere before - that’s it. Men’s room wall in a bar named Hook, Line & Sinker on Aperture-4.”

And with those words from a fellow grifter he’d been drinking with, Ezra had taken off like a rabbit with its tail on fire.

No one got to look at you that way, especially while taking a shit.

He stalked through the crowded bar, not caring who he pushed aside, a tall, striking man with a mouth made for sin, soulful, whiskey-brown eyes that could nonetheless communicate your doom, and a natural blond streak on the right side of his head, the lightness commanding attention among his tousled, hazelnut curls.

A kiss of starlight, you called it.

And your words made him feel like he was made of starstuff. Made him feel like more than a one-armed, washed up Prospector, a harvester who couldn’t really harvest anymore, reduced to grifting around the Universe for whatever jobs he could charm his way into.

He’d always been lucky with his charm. Could talk his way into any woman’s smalls; but those days, the days of faceless women to drown his sorrows in, as interchangeable as any liquor bottle, were behind him since he’d met you.

Rainfall, he called you. Because you were essential to him the way rain was essential to most of the early Terras of the history books you so loved. Because he was sure as shit that he’d die without you. Waste away, become nothing but a footnote in the life you’d continue to shine in without him.

And he wouldn’t let other men look upon the one gem he’d found that was a thousand times more precious than aurelac.

Priceless, in fact.

He stormed into the men’s room, the stained door rickety, swinging in Ezra’s angry wake.

An unfortunate man - a floater too, by the look of him - stood by your picture, leering, his hands under his long jacket. In a second, Ezra could guess what the charlatan was up to.

Fury rose, dark like demon’s wings, in his gut.

He crossed the dirty space in three strides, ripped your picture from the wall, stuffed it in his pocket.

“Hey, fuck you man,” the floater began. “I don’t see your name-”

Ezra’s knife, concealed in a custom-made pocket on his sweater, was at the man’s throbbing pulsepoint in a hot second. He might only have one arm now, but he’d learned to use it with pinpoint accuracy. “Might want to rethink your words there, friend,” he said silkily, his tone soft. Deadly. “Lest they be your last.”

“Whoa, whoa.” The man held his hands up, empty palms out. The front of his coat darkened and Ezra noted with faint disgust that the stranger had pissed himself. “I didn’t see nothing, all right? Please, don’t kill me.”

“Killing you would be a waste of resources,” Ezra sighed, smiling cheerfully at the shuddering man. “I’m thinking it’s kinder all around to let you live out your miserable life. Don’t you?”

He pulled his knife away, leaving a single drop of blood to run down the shivering stranger’s pale, fleshy throat, and left the men’s room, pushing the door open so hard it creaked on its old, rusty hinges.

Once safely outside under a canopy of lab-grown trees - the only way trees existed in the mess they called cities, these days - he took the flyer out, studied it.

There you were. Rainfall. He mouthed the moniker he’d given you. Your breasts spilled out of a corset, half-drawn so your nipples could be seen, tempting, round. Your legs were curled under you but you wore no underwear, so the curls between your legs peeked out.

He knew you were no blushing virgin when you’d met. You had known other men. You had trusted them.

And this was how one of those men had thanked you for your trust, your body, your heart.

Ezra recognised the little doodle in the right hand corner of the flyer. He’d seen it before, on counterfeit ales, on counterfeit... Recreational substances.

And thanks to his grubby past, he knew exactly where to find this particular felon.

*****

“Rainfall?”

You looked up from the bread you kneaded - an outdated by enjoyable pastime, sometimes made tricky by the fact you could only get soya flour (crappy rise) - to see Ezra coming in through the door.

“Ez. I was worried! You’re two days overdue.” You left the bread in a sorry heap and crossed the room, throwing your arms around him, burying your nose in the curve where his shoulder met his neck. He’d taken his suit off in your makeshift porch, and wore his undersuit and boots, his hair a little sweaty, curling at his nape and over his forehead. He nuzzled your hair.

“I’m as sorry as can be, Rainfall. Had a little extra business to take care of.”

It was then that you noted the smear of blood on his forearm. “Ezra.” You snatched his arm, searching for the tear in the suit.

“Oh. Ain’t mine, sweet girl.”

The breath whoosed out of you, and you lifted your face for his kiss, so happy to have him home, this man who made you complete, whose broken parts completed the missing pieces of your own personal jigsaw.

Ezra indulged you, pressing his lips to yours, and you opened greedily for him. He snaked his arm around your waist, pulling you close as your tongues danced. You drank him in, the flavour of his habitual chicory coffee, mint chocolate protein bars, and something distinctly Ezra that you could never replicate in a thousand cycles.

“Found a flyer of you, Rainfall,” he muttered against your cheek, his facial scruff tickling pleasantly. “Adorning the filthy wall of a restroom on Aperture-4. Cheap entertainment for those without morals, men passed over by common decency, with gaping holes where their souls should reside.”

You bit your lip. “What the hell-”

“The culprit must have been a former paramour of yours, sweet girl.” Ezra let you go to pull the flyer from his pocket, showing it to you.

Your face fell as you took it, examining the picture closely, memories churning. “Yes. It was…. Almost ten cycles ago, now. He said that was for his private collection. Then, soon after, I found other girls…. Posing for his ‘private collection’ and I ended it. Oh, I should tell him-” You crumpled it in your palm, angry with yourself.

“A chore you need not trouble yourself with, Rainfall.”

You looked at Ezra askance, and then something dark passed over his face. The way Ezra could switch from charming to sinister in a heartbeat was one of the things that had most intrigued you about him, when you’d met two cycles ago.

And then you had dug deeper into this gorgeous puzzle of a man, and found light and shadow, softness and jagged edges. And you had fallen, hopelessly, for every part of him, even the missing ones, because they too, told a story.

“I may have had a fair illuminating conversation with your old flame.”

“Ezra…”

“The temptation to kill him was strong, I must confess, but I let him live, with all his appendages attached.” Ezra gazed down at you fondly, cupping your cheek. “Seems it may be a while before he’s moved to approach another woman, though.”

“Sometimes, Ezra, your moral compass is skewed just right.” You held him tightly. “Thankyou. The thought of a private picture, being shared that way-”

He nuzzled your hair, breathed in, sighed happily. “Can’t say it was entirely altruistic, Rainfall. Don’t sit well with me, others lookin’ on your beauty. You’re mine, and I don’t share well.” He kissed you fiercely, his arm banded around you, holding you close as could be.

“Yeah? I don’t share either.” You nipped at his lip. “I’ve missed you, and you interrupted at the perfect time.” You nodded towards the sorry-looking dough on the kitchen counter. “No way I’m getting a rise out of that.” Cheekily, you slid a hand down his body to cup him where he’d started to grow hard for you. “But I might be in luck, now you’re home.”

Ezra turned you in a circle, walking you slowly backwards towards your bedroom, dropping kisses on your neck as his hand worked the buttons of your rainy-stay-home jumpsuit. “My sweet girl. I’ll always endeavour to come home to you.”

Tagging the Pedro pals: @songsformonkeys @dornish-queen @lackofhonor @buckstaposition @pedropascallion @starlight-starwrites @thegreenkid @keeper0fthestars @opheliaelysia @a-seeker-of-imagination @nelba @scarlettvonsass @synystersilenceinblacknwhite @cryptkeepersoul @alwaysbethewest @emmy-dandiliom918 @agirllovespasta @marydjarin @littlemissthistle @holographic-carmen @phoenixhalliwell @knittingqueen13 @badassbaker @chews-erotically @10-96dispatcher @pascalitomorales @ahopelessromanticwritersworld @seawhisperer @readsalot73 @alldatalost @abuttoncalledsmalls @winters-buck @jaime1110 @mrsparknuts @oloreaa

And people who did not ask to be tagged but might like this: @ezrasarm @summersong69 @havenforafrazzledmind @maytheglitter @gamingaquarius @lackofhonor @roxypeanut @ohpedromypedro @auty-ren @queenofheavenandhell @annathewitch @theravenreads @this-cat-is-dea

Please ask to be added to, or released from, the tags!

#ezra x reader #ezra prospect

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lvnce-mcclain · 4 years

Text

Okay so pt2 of this, (pt 3 here and then here’s pt 4) didn’t want to reblog since it was already getting too long. But here goes thoughts on this AU for the rest of s2:

So yeah, imagine Buck and Eddie having all that history going into s2. Imagine Buck still being struck dumb when he sees Eddie changing at the station that first day, completely speechless when his brain finally connects face to memory. Imagine Eddie having so much turmoil over the feelings that spark up at seeing his old teammate again, having Buckley back at his side. It makes Eddie’s transition to the team go a lot smoother in the long run, although there’s still a bit of a rough patch that first shift.

(So Eddie is a still little peeved when he recognizes Buckley, and he can’t keep the bitterness out of his voice when he makes a quip about not abandoning this team, Buckley immediately shutting down at the disapproval and getting defensive. But then there’s the call with the ambulance, and Eddie is thrown back in the field with Buckley by his side on one of those rare good days of his, and Eddie is sure of the man flanking him when they’re climbing into the ambulance together. They manage to handle the explosive and no one dies, and at the end when Eddie is smiling too bright and clapping a shoulder saying, “You can still have my back any day, Buckley,” and too-blue eyes shine back with, “Buck. Call me Buck. And you—you can have mine too” and a grin that has Buckley’s—Buck, Buck, Buck’s—lips splitting wide.)

Imagine how differently Buck would grow as a character. He learned his lesson about where he belongs a little too late in this AU, and imagine the potential for how much Buck would mourn every life he wasn’t able to save when he was active. Imagine how heavy it laid on his shoulders every time he had to pull the trigger, imagine how deeply he must have been hiding from his father’s disappointment in him if he let himself get pulled so far off from his own moral track to make it as far as he did while on active duty.

Buck still has a streak of promiscuity after he gets discharged, because Eddie’s words may have been enough to subdue him in their company but not where all those rules couldn’t touch him anymore. I sincerely think Buck still needs to have his Abby arc, it’s such a good arc for him imo even though I wish there was more closure at the end. So when Eddie shows up and tumbles back into his life, Buck is a little more willing to move on out of Abby’s apartment at a more reasonable pace.

He struggles a little less with coping over being ghosted, or rather realizing he’s the ghost or whatever, because he sees a potential place for him to belong and jumps at it. (Which would still need to be addressed eventually, this perpetual need of Buck’s to be useful to prove his own worth to himself and everyone, constantly.) Ohhh and imagine how much more the Earthquake episode would hit with Buck’s absolute resolution to get Eddie home to not just a picture of a little boy, but full-fleshed Christopher who Buck has been a fan of ever since he talked Eddie down into just accepting that little boy into his life and letting that be enough, even when Christopher was only a faceless name through stories in the desert. Imagine how much more would be behind that already relieved longing Buck showed in the scene where Eddie holds Chris at the school.

And it just makes sense, really—Buck reassures himself repeatedly—that Buck moves in with Eddie and Chris after things settle back down. At this point Eddie has made it clear how much he’s struggling with the childcare issues with being a single dad and Buck finds himself hiding from lonely nights by hanging out with his two favorite Diaz’s more often than not these last few months. When some of the rest of the team express concern—mostly through jokes, mind you, like comments about “lovebirds moving too fast” and other inane shit like that—over it, Buck’s ready with a stupid, rehearsed presentation to Eddie about why being roommates would be beneficial to “all parties involved, c’mon Eddie it’s not ‘just the two of us, you idiot’ Chris is a party too!”, with a large portion of it all dedicated to how Buck would be useful in sharing household duties and can help watch Christopher on Eddie’s work days if they’re not on shift together.

Already Eddie is feeling pretty persuaded but then Buck ends this whole spiel with a check towards his phone and a really vague mention of a friend coming over to meet them, and right on time the doorbell rings and in walks the biggest personality Eddie never knew he needed in his life. Carla is fantastic off the bat, and when Buck mentions near the end that Carla would help him no matter what he decided regarding the roommate situation, of course, Eddie is blinking so dumbly at Buck he nearly has to shake himself back to normal.

Because imagine how different it’s been for Eddie. Getting home to his parents already defensive on him getting to parent his own child, how hard he tries to stay with them as long as possible because everyone says that’s what best for Christopher after being abandoned by both parents, can’t you see he needs the stability only we can provide him? Until one day he sees an opportunity to start fresh and he grabs at it with flailing fingers, and Christopher is the only light in this dark as shit tunnel they seem to be stuck in.

But then in comes Buck, and Eddie learns a good lesson about letting people back into his life. Imagine how much relief there must have been the moment Eddie realizes an old partner was going to be by his side in this terrifying transition in Eddie’s life, not only at work but also taking some of the burden of parenthood off Eddie’s shoulders like it weighs nothing at all. Imagine how much Eddie needed that kind of stability around this time.

So imagine Eddie calling the whole presentation dumb after Carla leaves but rolling his eyes with a smile and Buck knows he got em, and just grins and asks too brightly, “yeah??” and Eddie can’t help but smile and tell him there’s no one else he’d rather be roommates with too much affection to be strictly teasing. And from the warmth in Buck’s eyes he can read that affection with ease, but he doesn’t say anything about it. He just smiles and starts planning the move excitedly.

Imagine s2 progressing the same, except now Buck and Eddie are 10x more comfortable with each other and god. Can you imagine the room for angst and emotional exploration with Shannon coming back into Eddie’s life with Buck already so ingrained in it? How Eddie would be torn towards wanting to try and fit back into the picture of what a happy family and marriage had always looked to him, but everything aching in him to lean towards Buck and the beginnings of their little sketched out family with Chris.

Imagine Buck trying to distance himself out of respect for Eddie and his marriage because he in no way wants to come in between Eddie and anything that would make him and Christopher happy; he’s firmly resolved if that means Shannon back in their lives, then so be it. But Eddie surprises him with the decision to limit contact with his wife—tells her that she can be part of Christopher’s life once she’s proven she can be trusted not to disappear, but that Eddie didn’t want anything beyond what’s necessary.

(Imagine Christopher getting to keep his mom and get his Buck too, because hey, we don’t have to kill off women to give men more backstory in this AU.)

Imagine Buck taking this as a step toward something he realizes he’s craving from Eddie: more. Imagine the soft touches and questioning looks and the longing that’s possible with all the domestic scenes after this. Imagine the fire fam getting absolutely insufferable with comments. But then there’s everything with Maddie and there’s not much time to consider anything beyond that. And then—then there’s the Accident and we go into s3, which I also have some Thoughts on.

#buddie #buddie fic #buddie meta #my fic #s3 thoughts might be tomorrow tho #bc its getting late and #my high is wearing off lol #buddie au

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obitohatescops · 4 years

Text

Thinking about obikona

They’re young, they both have observably hot bodies, and they don’t really have anyone to turn to for sex unless they want one night stands or to pay.

Maybe it is initiated out of frustration, maybe one of them brings up the possibility and they explore from there.

Konan is immediately suspicious of his refusal to strip more than his pants (if that) and through their relationship figures out that he isn’t the real Madara. She keeps her thoughts to herself, she wants to figure out who he is behind his back.

(In a way, she’s actually glad that he never undresses. He’s a faceless being dressed in black with nothing to really distinguish him from other men but his mask. The orange mask that, if she tries hard enough, becomes short, spiky, orange hair that she can run her fingers through and grip.)

Meanwhile, Obito is starting to feel positive feelings toward her. Before, she was little more than a pawn, someone to command and keep on his side for the plan. But now he feels sparks of lust, of affection, and of yearning.

Eventually, he stays after they’re done. They don’t really cuddle, but they’re touching. He feels vulnerable, relaxed, and the need to develop their relationship to something more than vaguely neutral and sexual.

He tells her about how she’s his first. She turns her head to look at him, eyes slightly widened. Then he chuckles and whispers about how he hadn’t even kissed anyone yet.

They stay silent afterwards and Konan tells him that he’s her first, too. She tells him that she had only loved Yahiko and had wanted him to be her first.

He asks her why she never tried anything with Nagato via Yahiko’s body.

She becomes furious, pulls away from him and gets out of bed. As she opens the door and turns to leave, she whispers “don’t ever poison Yahiko’s memory again”

By the time she returns, freshly showered, he’s gone.

They don’t see each for months.

When he does return, he keeps his distance. He regrets saying what he did. Not only because he misses Konan, but because he also understands what was wrong with what he said.

Surprisingly, he regrets hurting her. He hadn’t thought it possible.

Eventually, he confronts her and apologizes. She says nothing in return, he leaves.

Whenever they see each other after that, it’s only for Akatsuki matters.

A year or two later, circumstances place them together. Their relationship has mostly returned to their pre-benefits one but neither are particularly happy about it.

With the goal of trying to get their previous dynamic back (but also because he still feels things towards her, not that he’d admit it), he tells her about Rin.

He tells her about how Rin was his everything: his first friend, his best friend, his teammate, his biggest supporter, his strong pillar of faith, and his first love. He loved her, he still loves her, but it is a love that isn’t romantic; not anymore.

He tells her about how circumstances separated them before he could tell her.

He tells her about how she was killed. Dead, at 14. He tells her about how the cruel world that they inhabit forces good people to die young. The world isn’t right and everyone who makes it out is trash meant to keep the cycle going.

Rin wasn’t his reason, but she was his light; she brightened the cruel world enough that he could drown out the darkness and she revealed his true path.

Konan listens. Eventually, she compares him to Nagato. And herself.

They sit in silence, and while it was heavy, it was also comforting. They understand each other. They share the same goal (albeit with different details, known only by Obito). And they can support each other.

They don’t have sex that night, but when Konan gives Tobi a look during a meeting a few days later, he visits and stays the night.

It isn’t love, and it may never be, but they both enjoy their mutual fondness for each other.

(Konan still wants to find his real identity, but if she isn’t putting more effort into it, she thinks she can be forgiven. Her priorities lie with Akatsuki and “Madara’s” goals still line up with her own, so who cares who he used to be.)

(Years later, with goals shifted and fondness waning quickly, Konan opens Uchiha Obito’s file. She learns nothing that can help her in her upcoming battle with him. She learns nothing of value, but she does finally see his face. It’s the standard shinobi identification picture, nothing particularly special. But he has orange-tinted goggles on his head and a bright smile on his face. She can’t help but see Yahiko for a second.)

(His other teammate is Hatake Kakashi of the Sharingan. He “died” and gave Hatake his Sharingan. He wears a mask with only one eyehole. Maybe this is of value, after all; he still only has one eye, after all. She knows how she can counter his abilities.)

(His jonin sensei was the other student of Jiraiya, the one he kept. Maybe his desire to change the world is also inherited from him.)

(It’s funny how 3 different student lines resulted in world-changing goals. She had chosen to follow Nagato down his path, and combined his goal with Obito’s (was manipulated). Now she chooses to follow Naruto’s path.)

(She should have known better. But she still doesn’t deserve to die like this. Not with that hard glare of Sharingan red trapping her in a genjustu for the rest of her suddenly short life. Not with that strong grip around her neck, the one that used to bring her comfort and pleasure.)

(She had just found her path again, her light had just returned to her in the form of Naruto. Now this false spark will extinguish her life before she could see where the light would have led her.)

Okay, wow that went down a path I wasn’t expecting. The parenthesis portion at the end is for a more canon-compliant route, but I’d prefer Konan to live. They don’t have to end up together (as I am a kakaobi bitch) but I’d love for them to end on a positive note and become something like friends.

#obikona #obikonan #konan #obito uchiha #uchiha obito #obito #kinda angsty #my fanfic writing #in bullet point form #naruto fanfiction #naruto

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atinytokki · 3 years

Text

Across the Night

iv. The Monarch Embarks

Kon was every bit the bustling harbour town Seonghwa imagined it to be.

Mr. Hwang was dragging his trunk up the dock for him as he glanced around, doe-eyed, at all the sights of the town.

“Dread Pirate Eden still roaming free!” A young man suddenly appeared, yelling at the top of his lungs with no qualms about personal space. “Navy increases reward incentive!”

He waved a news bulletin in Seonghwa’s face, but backed off when he stumbled away, hurrying after Mr. Hwang and inquiring about the headline.

“You haven’t heard of Eden?” The man snorted, handing off some barrels to the sailors who were loading the boat. “He’s only the most infamous pirate still in business.”

Hwang motioned to the many posters with a crudely drawn illustration plastered all over the walls of buildings in every corner of the city. The man pictured looked unassuming for a pirate, but angry red script demanding his capture warned otherwise, and Seonghwa shivered before passing off his bag.

It seemed that even pirates were unlike his childhood fantasy tales made them out to be.

Just as he made ready to board the Monarch, the beautifully careened vessel he’d be living on for their supply delivery, a familiar voice broke through the noise of the harbour and stopped him in his tracks.

“Seonghwa! Wait!”

It sounded like a female voice.

Eyes widening, Seonghwa turned and ran back down the gangplank to meet the approaching woman in a hug.

It was Chaeyoung.

“How did you get here?” He laughed, impressed that she had come all the way down the river just to see him off.

“I told the driver to hurry, because my best friend is not allowed to leave without saying goodbye,” she shot back, punching him lightly in the shoulder and laughing when he pouted and rubbed the spot.

It still hurt, and more than it did when they played around as children.

“Chaeyoung, I don’t know what I’ll do without you,” Seonghwa confessed, sobering as he could sense the time of departure was nearing.

Nodding, she bit her lip and lowered her head, eyes coming to rest on the whistle around her neck.

“You know my father spends many days at sea,” she reminded him before pulling off the necklace and holding it up for him to see. “This is a boatswain’s whistle he gave me as a present. Except I’d like to give it to you... as a goodbye.”

Seonghwa’s eyes filled with tears instantly. “Chaeyoung, I can’t take this—”

“I insist!” She cut him off, placing the whistle in his palm and folding his hands over it. “You’ll get more use out of it than I will.”

“I want to see you again,” Seonghwa told her thickly, struggling through the newly formed ball in his throat.

“I hope one day you will,” Chaeyoung smiled at him sweetly, her face like the light of the moon. “But I think you’ve got a lot of exploring to do first. I’ve found my calling, and so has Donghyun. Now it’s your turn.”

Out of words to say, Seonghwa pulled her into a tight hug, grinning slightly at the fact that he finally had a few inches on her, and put the necklace on with finality.

“Say goodbye to Chan for me,” he sighed as they parted, Chaeyoung lifting her skirts to step into the carriage. “Safe travels!”

“Safe travels to you as well!” She called back, waving through the window and growing smaller as the driver urged the horses up the hill and back towards Doljeon.

Seonghwa wondered if he’d ever see her again.

“All aboard the Monarch! Weighing anchor in five minutes!”

Jolted out of his reverie, Seonghwa hurried up the gangplank and looked around the ship for Mr. Hwang.

Not seeing him anywhere on the main level, Seonghwa was about to climb the stairs to the quarterdeck and ask the man at the wheel, presumably the captain, when a hand clamped down on his shoulder and spun him around.

“Any man who is not an officer may only stand on the quarterdeck when summoned,” the intimidating sailor told him gruffly, and stuttering apologetically, Seonghwa backed away.

Just when he thought he was safe and had avoided any more embarrassment, his backwards step caused his foot to get caught in a loop of rope and bring him crashing down.

The sailors who watched him stumble all over their rigging merely snickered as he tried to untangle himself hurriedly.

“Need a hand?” Mr. Hwang finally appeared and helped the poor boy up, brushing him off and escorting him belowdecks.

“We’ll be underway any minute now,” he explained as he helped Seonghwa secure his hammock. “I’m sure you aren’t used to sharing your space, but the Monarch is made to carry cargo, not people, and all the lower ranks bunk together. My hammock will be over here if you need me.”

Seonghwa followed the man’s gesture with his eyes and nodded in acknowledgement before setting his personal bag on his hammock. There were a few odds and ends he’d brought from home to make the space feel familiar, since Mother had warned him there wouldn’t be much more than a ratty blanket on offer. The faceless pirate he’d saved from his childhood toys peeked back at him.

“This is your first time on a ship, isn’t it?” Hwang observed knowingly from the doorway.

Seonghwa sighed and affirmed it. As much as he’d dreamed about the sea during his lazy afternoons, he’d never actually laid eyes on it. And whether that would become a problem or not was unclear as of yet.

“Well, you’ll probably want to see the action then,” the older man concluded, beckoning Seonghwa back onto the main deck with him where they stood out of the way and watched the sailors make ready to leave port.

“Man the capstan!” The man from before on the quarterdeck was yelling. “Hands aloft to loose the mainsails!”

The rest of the men seemed to know what those commands meant and snapped to, some of them bringing up the anchor by the strength of their backs, and others climbing the rigging with agile ease and unfurling sails to catch the wind.

The Monarch began to move, and Seonghwa looked out over the railing as Kon began to grow smaller. It was entrancing, unlike the slow meandering carriage that had brought him there, how quickly the wind caught the sails and bore them away, like the three hundred pound sloop was weightless.

“Boom about!”

The loud yell startled Seonghwa, and he turned around just in time to see the beam underneath the mainsail swinging at full speed in his direction.

Mr. Hwang’s hand on his arm tightened and yanked him out of way, both of them continuing to duck while Seonghwa willed his heart rate to return to normal.

“Keep your eye on that thing, it can sweep you right overboard,” Hwang cautioned. “In fact, I think you’d better stay close to me, today and for your entire apprenticeship. You’ll need to learn not just the art of the cooper, but how to survive at sea. I’ll reckon it’s like nothing you’ve ever experienced before.”

Seonghwa swallowed nervously and nodded again, rubbing his head where the boom had almost smacked him, and hesitantly got to his feet.

A few sailors who had witnessed the whole thing were chuckling at him and his face went cherry red.

Thinking to hide away downstairs and escape yet again, Seonghwa turned back towards the hatch that led belowdecks, only to have Hwang take him by the arm again and drag him over to the stairs to the quarterdeck.

“Permission to speak with the captain?” The cooper requested formally and the burly man guarding the staircase allowed the two of them to pass.

“Good morning, Captain Bae,” Mr. Hwang greeted, nudging Seonghwa forward to be introduced. “I thought you’d like to meet the newest member of our crew, my apprentice and our cook.”

“You say you found someone to cook for us?” The captain hummed without looking up from where he studied some maps.

“Yessir,” Mr. Hwang repeated a little bit louder. “Here he is, Park Seonghwa.”

Finally the man glanced up at the pair through his wiry spectacles and reached out a hand politely.

Seonghwa shook it carefully, minding the captain’s ink stained sleeve cuffs, and peeked down at the chart he appeared to be marking.

“Well that is good news,” Captain Bae chuckled as he returned to his work. “I’m sure Hwang here told you, but old man Tak Moon has been doing the cooking the past couple of years after the previous chef was shot full of lead by pirates in the Somhae pass. You’ll want to get to know him.”

Seonghwa opened his mouth and closed it again as the words hit him full force. “After he was— pardon me, after what?”

Captain Bae laughed and slapped him on the back, inevitably leaving behind an ink trace while Seonghwa squirmed. “Nothing to be afraid of. The Navy cleared the archipelago of nearly all pirates infesting our trade routes. At any rate, they’re on the decline and we have full cargo and smooth sailing ahead of us. Say, Namgoong, did our textiles client happen to send a message along with his shipment last night?”

With the captain once again distracted and conversing with the man who guarded the quarterdeck, Seonghwa took that as his opportunity to nudge Mr. Hwang back down to the main deck to follow their orders and find this old man Tak.

The way the deck rolled underneath them was making Seonghwa dizzy, but he stiffened and struggled through back to the hatch where Hwang led him to the galley.

Pausing with his hand just above the doorknob, he turned back and flashed a halfhearted smile. “Don’t let him startle you, he likes picking on greenies.”

Seonghwa had no time to question what that meant before the door was swung open and he was greeted with a very sharp smell.

A bearded old sailor sat on the floor against a black wall, sorting through piles of cheese very studiously despite being surrounded by food of every other kind.

The galley was... unorganised to say the least.

“Who’s this? The sorry lad you found to replace me?”

Seonghwa’s polite smile faded and the sight of it made the old man cackle.

“He’s a much better cook than you are, Tak,” Mr. Hwang joked back. “But you and I both know this was a only temporary job anyway, you belong above decks.”

As he inspected the piles of food stored away, Seonghwa realised that Mr. Tak apparently only knew how to make soup. And from the looks of things, the kitchen had been on fire at least once.

“I’ll leave you to breakfast then,” Hwang concluded with a hardy slap to both their backs and headed for the door.

“Do you have any fresh fruit?” Seonghwa asked the old man hesitantly, and in response he got a mouse trap shoved in his face.

“Can’t you see I’m busy with the rats? Fresh fruit — wait until you’re stuck weeks out of the colonies with no supplies because of a tax kerfuffle! Then you’ll be wishing for fresh fruit!”

Suppressing a sigh, Seonghwa resolved to search on his own and left Tak to his tinkering. It was calming, to do something he was familiar with for once and let Mr. Hwang serve the morning meal to the crew so he didn’t have to show his face on deck again. Breakfast could have been better, but he wagered it was an improvement on whatever they’d been eating previously as he wrinkled his nose and threw himself into planning the next meal.

The entire day was consumed with cooking and planning and familiarising himself with the galley. Tak stayed out of his way for the most part, and by late evening Seonghwa was tired enough to seek refuge in his hammock, mind racing throughout the night with ideas for the rest of the week.

But of course, while he stirred his dumplings three days out, tragedy struck in the form of seasickness.

He had been feeling uncomfortable all morning, with the humid and confined space, the boat rushing upwind, the smell of the food and swirling vertigo all becoming too much to handle.

Seonghwa shouted out something about being nauseous and Tak was there to guide him upstairs to the rail of the main deck.

“Vomit to leeward!” He cautioned gruffly, steering his young charge downwind by the neck and letting him heave into the ocean waves.

Seonghwa slumped to the deck at some point, exhausted and still considerably dizzy, and let Tak drag him below again when he was sure he was done.

“I may just be an old salt, but you’re no mariner, boy,” the man clicked his tongue disapprovingly. “You’re, what, sixteen and have never been at sea?”

“He’s just the cook, there’s no reason for him to have prior knowledge about sailing,” Mr. Hwang’s voice explained from somewhere and when the room stopped spinning, Seonghwa realised they were in the hold where the bunks where. “What did you do to him, Tak Moon?”

“It wasn’t me, he’s green at the gills like I warned you he would be,” Tak defended himself in that sassy tone of voice he always used. “Now, if you’ll let me go make the landlubber some ginger tea, you can be the one to tuck him in bed.”

Seonghwa didn’t think his stomach could handle anything at all right now, but just as he bit his lip to keep from whining, the cooper crossed in front of him and blocked his route to bed.

“Hang on, let’s switch your hammock around. Fore-to-aft so you don’t feel the pitch of the ship as harshly. It’ll pass when the waters are calmer for sure, but I don’t want to eat Tak’s food for dinner tonight, so the sooner you’re on your feet again, the better.”

It was supposed to be funny but Seonghwa was too fatigued to even crack a smile and so he collapsed in his bed, swinging much less violently than it was before Hwang moved it, and squeezed his eyes shut.

Time passed unnaturally quickly, because when he opened them again, the teacup sitting next to him had grown cold and night had fallen.

Closing his eyes for a time had improved his condition considerably, but the presence of so many men snoring in their hammocks made Seonghwa slightly claustrophobic again, so he took his tea and tiptoed to the kitchen, warming it over the fire and drinking it quickly.

Glancing at the corner, he wrinkled his nose at the presence of rats caught in the traps, but noticed another stinky scent, not from the rodents or the accumulated cheese.

Following his nose took him to the lower decks, where the quartermaster Namgoong was consoling the agitated livestock.

In the past few days, Seonghwa had learned that the intimidating officer who guarded the quarterdeck was actually much more soft and compassionate on the inside than he had anticipated.

Though he maintained his gruff appearance with the crew, he had a special affection for the animals, even knowing they were likely to be slaughtered for meat when they reached their destination.

“They don’t like rough weather either,” Seonghwa observed quietly, and the other man turned his head in surprise, not expecting to see him.

“No, it makes them uneasy. Feeling better?”

The boy ducked his head as nervousness took over again but nodded while Namgoong was looking on.

“I think so...”

The sailor made a knowing sound and gave the cattle a final pat before turning to face him.

“Half of overcoming seasickness is mental. Just tell yourself you’re fine and you will be.”

“Right,” Seonghwa sighed. “It still won’t help save my life if I do fall overboard. I can’t swim well enough.”

“You don’t know how to swim?” Namgoong whispered back, shocked, before snorting and leading his charge back to the hold. “Well, that’s your first order of business when we reach our port of call, then. Off to bed now.”

Seonghwa didn’t put up a fight, ready to melt away his exhaustion again, and when he awoke the next morning, all his remedies seemed to have paid off.

The Monarch sailed smoothly for the rest of her short journey, and by the date their shipment was due they had docked on the archipelago and unloaded successfully.

While some of the more business-minded crew dealt with the sales and negotiations, Seonghwa found himself a free stretch of public beach on the island where they’d docked, Namhae, and under the ever watchful eye of Mr. Hwang, practiced his swimming.

He had appointed himself as a guardian (or else Mother had appointed him herself) and took it upon himself to teach the swimming lesson personally, showcasing various strokes and techniques and sternly warning Seonghwa against ever jumping overboard before realising the day had gone and going into town to find them an inn.

It was comfortable around Hwang. Seonghwa hesitated to think of him as a father figure, but couldn’t help but enjoy having him there. He taught him the kinds of things fathers usually taught their sons, and where Seonghwa’s mother had left off, he picked up smoothly and naturally.

Sometimes Seonghwa found himself wishing Mr. Hwang was his father, not the mysterious king who lived far away in the palace and wouldn’t even recognise him, but he stopped his thinking and rolled over in bed to face the wall.

The sea offered freedom, there was no reason to tether himself to someone when his focus should be the escape that seeing the world could offer.

The remainder of deliveries along the archipelago and the return trip were relatively uneventful, but their arrival at Kon found Seonghwa dressed and ready to go and embark on another voyage to some more distant place, nervously pacing at the door by the time Hwang appeared for breakfast, and the older man sat him down and chuckled at him before explaining, “We’ll be called back when we have another job and not a moment sooner. That’s just the nature of shore leave.”

Harvest was just around the corner, and the crew was permitted to celebrate with their families. It left the question of what Seonghwa ought to do when Hwang’s carriage came to bring him back to Doljeon, where his wife and daughters waited.

“Would you like us to drop you off at Lina’s?” Mr. Hwang yelled, sticking his head out the window and catching the gaze of a very anxious Seonghwa, standing on the dock with his things piled up awkwardly in his hands again.

“Yes, please!” He exclaimed, relieved, before loading up and sliding into a seat.

Fireworks were shooting off ahead, lighting up the sky in an explosively dazzling celebration while the town danced and sang, and the colours that streaked down were mesmerising.

Deep down, Seonghwa hoped it would bode well on his reunion with Mother.

He was wrong.

Seonghwa believed his first short sailing trip had already changed him, but from the moment he walked in the door only to be encased like a glass sculpture in her arms, he knew she didn’t see it that way.

“Still so fragile. I thought you would at least have more of a tan...” she sighed into his coat as she squeezed him in a hug.

“Mother, I will, it’s just that it’s only been a short trip, not to mention the weather.”

Mr. Hwang saw the storm clouds gathering between them and tipped his hat in farewell.

It quickly became apparent why Mother had allowed this arrangement in the first place. She hoped Seonghwa would not be up to the task after all, changing his mind and remaining in Doljeon with her once he’d tasted hardship. She thought life at sea would ultimately return him home, not separate him from her further.

It was a losing battle, but she fought and clawed hard over dinner while they stared each other down and didn’t touch the harvest feast Seonghwa had cooked in an angry blur.

Mother had no choice but to reveal her true intentions when he had deflected every concern expertly and the frankness of it all was nauseating.

“No, I’m sorry, but I don’t think sailing is right for you. I mean, what if you fall overboard? You can’t even swim.”

“But Mr. Hwang actually taught me while we were in Namhae—”

“Then there’s the matter of your pay, it’s quite low,” Mother shot back. “Are you not working enough to match their expectations? I’m sorry, this is all my fault to have left you incapable—”

“Mother, that’s enough!” Seonghwa finally snapped, standing from the table and throwing down his napkin. “How can you expect me to be thriving when you’ve given me so little time? I haven’t even started helping with the cooper business yet, can’t you wait for the revenue to come in before making your judgment?”

“Seonghwa, dear—”

“No!” He burst out in a scream that shook the windows. “I’ve had enough! I am not weak and helpless, I’m learning and discovering myself. You already destroyed my life when you stole me, you have no right to meddle in it now. If you won’t give me a say in my own future, just stay away from me!”

Shocked to be scorned so completely, Mother didn’t even move from her chair as Seonghwa ran from the house in tears.

He had never been sure of what he wanted, but at the moment he knew without question that he wanted to be away from her.

It had all just been another plot to manipulate him into self-doubt and self-hatred, to persuade him to choose to remain in her control, when in reality it had backfired to disastrous proportions.

Seonghwa had somewhere to go now, for however long he could.

He wouldn’t see that woman again.

...

A/N: The future is taking shape! Like the double meaning of the chapter title? Let me know what you thought in the comments and have a good week :)

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turtle-paced · 5 years

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Appreciation Post: Arya Stark

Arya’s stitches were crooked again.

Right away we see the problem: Arya Stark is not cut out for the life that her society, family included, tells her that she must live. Arya is eight and this is already apparent. Audience sympathy is quickly and firmly with this scrappy, curious, gregarious little girl who doesn’t want to abide by the sexist, classist rules of her society, which tell her what she should dress like, what she should be good at, and who she should be friends with.

The seriousness - and the potential consequences- of Arya’s disregard for these particular social mores is established at the infamous Incident at Darry. Arya made friends with the butcher’s boy Mycah, and sneaks off to play with him. These games are rougher than what is deemed acceptable for noble girls. When Joffrey discovers them and tries to bully Mycah with a drawn sword, Arya intervenes in her friend’s defence.

Though Arya’s sense of social justice was already apparent -

"The woman is important too!" Arya protested.

- Arya I, AGoT

- her attempted defence of Mycah and humiliation of Joffrey starts a thread that continues throughout her storyline all series. Arya believes in justice. Her immediate short-term discovery that the people who she loves and trusts don’t share her beliefs with her urgency, to the cost of her friend, is a hard one for her to cope with. Getting some direction for this and a means to channel her energies is what helps her manage best.

"Let me tell you something about wolves, child. When the snows fall and the white winds blow, the lone wolf dies, but the pack survives. Summer is the time for squabbles. In winter, we must protect one another, keep each other warm, share our strengths. So if you must hate, Arya, hate those who would truly do us harm.”

- Arya II, AGoT

"You," Ned said, kissing her lightly on the brow, "will marry a king and rule his castle, and your sons will be knights and princes and lords and, yes, perhaps even a High Septon."

Arya screwed up her face.

"No," she said, "that's Sansa." She folded up her right leg and resumed her balancing.

- Eddard V, AGoT

As we can see here, Arya’s relationship with her father is positive and loving, but that does not negate the fact that he’s the source of some of the social pressure to adhere to a certain model of femininity that Arya struggles with.

Thanks to Syrio Forel and a well-learned lesson about seeing the things that are really there, Arya escapes the massacre of the Stark household, and promptly learns that things are a bit different when she’s not the daughter of one of Westeros’ most powerful lords. Despite this, and despite the trauma of witnessing her father’s murder and accidentally killing a stableboy in her escape, she continues on. The scattering of her family drives her to find her own, and to stick with her friends. Or even just the people she’s with. Some of Arya’s best is on display when the Watch recruits are attacked, as Arya refuses to leave a child refugee behind or leave dangerous criminals to burn alive.

Going back into that barn was the hardest thing she ever did.

- Arya IV, ACoK

But she does it anyway, her sense of justice and compassion applying even to people as lovely as the three in the cage.

This does, however, mark the start of a more intense exposure to violence. Brought to Harrenhal, she gets to see Harrenhal, witnessing horrors large and small, and suffering some herself too. She’s our on the ground viewpoint for the suffering of the common people in the Riverlands. As is to be expected, this affect her. One of the more obvious effects is how Arya develops a list of people she hates.

Every night Arya would say their names. "Ser Gregor," she'd whisper to her stone pillow. "Dunsen, Polliver, Chiswyck, Raff the Sweetling. The Tickler and the Hound. Ser Amory, Ser Ilyn, Ser Meryn, King Joffrey, Queen Cersei." Back in Winterfell, Arya had prayed with her mother in the sept and with her father in the godswood, but there were no gods on the road to Harrenhal, and her names were the only prayer she cared to remember.

- Arya VI, ACoK

The assassin known as Jaqen H’ghar, in repayment for Arya saving his life, offers her three deaths. Even in this awful situation in Harrenhal, Arya retains a scrap of agency. What she does with those deaths is revealing - she orders the death of Chiswyck, who told a gruesome and graphic story of a gang rape he participated in as though it were a joke; she orders the death of her immediate supervisor Weese, a petty tyrant of the Harrenhal kitchens; and she orders the death of Jaqen H’ghar himself.

That last, Arya does to escape Harrenhal, still trying to get back to her family. Jaqen gives her a coin. Arya kills a guard herself to escape, deliberately and in cold blood.

Arya spends a good chunk of ASoS in the company of the Brotherhood Without Banners, who at the time are at trying to do their best for the smallfolk in the war, with good intentions and mixed, morally ambiguous results. When Sandor Clegane arrives, fleeing from the Blackwater, and Arya gets a chance to press the charge she never got to in AGoT:

Arya squirted past Greenbeard so fast he never saw her. "You are a murderer!" she screamed. "You killed Mycah, don't say you never did. You murdered him!"

The Hound stared at her with no flicker of recognition. "And who was this Mycah, boy?"

"I'm not a boy! But Mycah was. He was a butcher's boy and you killed him. Jory said you cut him near in half, and he never even had a sword."

- Arya VI, ASoS

The trial does not work out, and Arya refuses to accept the verdict. She’s promptly captured by Sandor himself.

Over the course of ASoS in particular, it’s clear that the narrative does not regard Arya’s ability to kill as ‘cool’ or ‘badass’. It is instead depicted as trauma. With Ned Dayne, for instance:

"I never learned the lance, but I could beat you with a sword," said Arya. "Have you killed anyone?"

That seemed to startle him. "I'm only twelve."

I killed a boy when I was eight, Arya almost said, but she thought she'd better not.

- Arya VIII, ASoS

It’s not a competition, but an observation that there’s something horribly wrong with this child asking whether other children have killed. Ned’s reply that he’s only twelve represents the norm.

And there was one girl who took to following her, the village elder's daughter. She was of an age with Arya, but just a child; she cried if she skinned a knee, and carried a stupid cloth doll with her everywhere she went. The doll was made up to look like a man-at-arms, sort of, so the girl called him Ser Soldier and bragged how he kept her safe. "Go away," Arya told her half a hundred times. "Just leave me be." She wouldn't, though, so finally Arya took the doll away from her, ripped it open, and pulled the rag stuffing out of its belly with a finger. "Now he really looks like a soldier!" she said, before she threw the doll in a brook. After that the girl stopped pestering her, and Arya spent her days grooming Craven and Stranger or walking in the woods.

- Arya XII, ASoS

That passage follows the Red Wedding, an even more traumatic event for Arya. After a book and a half of trying to get back to her mother and Robb, she’s present outside the event at which they’re murdered, never seeing them, unable to do anything to help them. This leaves Arya adrift.

Where would she go? Winterfell was gone. Her grandfather's brother was at Riverrun, but he didn't know her, no more than she knew him. Maybe Lady Smallwood would take her in at Acorn Hall, but maybe she wouldn't. Besides, Arya wasn't even sure she could find Acorn Hall again. Sometimes she thought she might go back to Sharna's inn, if the floods hadn't washed it away. She could stay with Hot Pie, or maybe Lord Beric would find her there. Anguy would teach her to use a bow, and she could ride with Gendry and be an outlaw, like Wenda the White Fawn in the songs.

But that was just stupid, like something Sansa might dream. Hot Pie and Gendry had left her just as soon as they could, and Lord Beric and the outlaws only wanted to ransom her, just like the Hound. None of them wanted her around. They were never my pack, not even Hot Pie and Gendry. I was stupid to think so, just a stupid little girl, and no wolf at all.

- Arya XII, ASoS

So we see the extent to which Arya needs family and community to help shore up her identity. This is exactly what makes her AFFC storyline with the Faceless Men possible. Not long after this passage, she leaves Sandor Clegane when he sickens from an infected wound. He might have killed Mycah, but he also helped Arya, and on balance Arya finds herself unable to kill him.

Arya goes to the Faceless Men, per Jaqen’s recommendation, because she feels she has nowhere else to go. What they offer Arya has powerful appeal for her after all that she’s suffered, and costs a lot, too. The House of Black and White will take her in and give her a purpose, if Arya sacrifices her entire identity.

Arya cannot do it.

Needle was Robb and Bran and Rickon, her mother and her father, even Sansa. Needle was Winterfell's grey walls, and the laughter of its people. Needle was the summer snows, Old Nan's stories, the heart tree with its red leaves and scary face, the warm earthy smell of the glass gardens, the sound of the north wind rattling the shutters of her room. Needle was Jon Snow's smile. He used to mess my hair and call me "little sister," she remembered, and suddenly there were tears in her eyes.

Polliver had stolen the sword from her when the Mountain's men took her captive, but when she and the Hound walked into the inn at the crossroads, there it was. The gods wanted me to have it. Not the Seven, nor Him of Many Faces, but her father's gods, the old gods of the north. The Many-Faced God can have the rest, she thought, but he can't have this.

- Arya II, AFFC

She cannot even truly give up being Arya Stark when she’s enjoying being Cat of the Canals. The very name is a hint that Arya’s identity is not subsumed - Cat - but she cannot get rid of the wolf dreams. (As demonstrated in Bran and Jon’s PoVs, Arya’s a skinchanger. We have direct evidence that she’s a very powerful skinchanger, maintaining her bond with her wolf across an ocean and later skinchanging into a cat as well.) Eventually, it’s Arya’s sense of what is right that brings her back - via murder, but it brings her back.

Arya killing the Night’s Watch deserter Dareon was the result of what Arya of House Stark learned about right and wrong. Part of the identity that the Faceless Men want Arya to shed are those very beliefs.

Arya drew back from him. "He killed the slave?" That did not sound right. "He should have killed the masters!"

- Arya II, AFFC

When she is ordered to kill someone, she starts by trying to convince herself they deserve it:

"He is an evil man," she announced that evening when she returned to the House of Black and White. "His lips are cruel, his eyes are mean, and he has a villain's beard."

The kindly man chuckled. "He is a man like any other, with light in him and darkness. It is not for you to judge him."

- The Ugly Little Girl, ADWD

Arya can and has killed, but she doesn’t do it without remorse, and we see that she’s struggling to do so for amoral reasons. Arya is angry and traumatised, but we see that she wants justice more than simple survival. That, and the importance she places on family and community, seem likely to me to be the way back from the brink. The girl who makes friends wherever she goes is going to have a part to play in the narrative, reminding others that for all the greater goods out there and in the future, the people here and now deserve justice and protection too.

#ASoIaF #valyrianscrolls #cw: violence #cw: rape #arya stark #a game of thrones #a clash of kings #a storm of swords #a feast for crows #a dance with dragons #another post not doing characters justice

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danwhobrowses · 4 years

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10 Things that would’ve Improved the Game of Thrones Final Season (For Me)

So it came to my attention that recently it was the First Anniversary of the Final Episode of HBO’s ‘Game of Thrones’. I was taken back to my memory of the BinGOT thing we had at work where we all made predictions of who lived, died and ‘won’ from the last ep (I was in 2nd or 3rd place). And since my mother has started binging it during quarantine I thought in the spirit of that environment I’d discuss a little what I would’ve changed in the final season.

Spoilers for Game of Thrones Season 8 Below, if you haven’t watched it then you’re better off not reading this frankly, if you haven’t been spoiled already at least.

So for starters, the final episode is not the worst tv I’ve ever seen, it just was a sloppy final season in general that really didn’t satisfy the 2 years of hype waiting for it, it’s like with the How I Met Your Mother finale, but that annoyance being more than one episode. But without further ado here are 10 things I would’ve changed about the final season Note: Most will involve the finale. The first 2 episodes were great.

10 - Ten Episodes The Long Night was 1 episode, the LONG NIGHT. A Culmination of the army of living and dead confined into one episode. One of the main problems with the final season was that the pacing was a bit rushed, it made character progression seem unnatural and dropped long-built plot points like water through a sieve. With 10 episodes, which was not a big ask given that this was the usual number and the gravitas of it being the final season would easily allow it to be green lit. D&D immediately backed themselves into a corner by giving a limit they weren’t used to and too much content to put in.

9 - Bite of the Spider Varys’ death was an upsetting start of the penultimate episode, while I would’ve loved him to have survived start to end and potentially ended on top (because he’s never shown to be as cunning or dangerous as he is in the books) there was some sense in him dying. However, Varys was shown sending a letter before his arrest and that never came back up, the finale could’ve used this by revealing to the public Jon’s true heritage, which would’ve immediately undermined Dany’s claim and set up a better conflict. Also we never knew what the voice in the flames said to him...

8 - A More Fitting Long Night While everyone probably popped hard for Arya killing the Night King, myself included, the nature of it was rather abrupt. I don’t think anyone can buy that she sneaked past that entire army. I do feel like the Night King was just a MacGuffin for the Long Night, given that he did so little in the actual fight. This is where a multi-part Long Night would’ve been key as well, going from the Night King being immune to Dragonfire to dying a bit later was not a good pace, and we lacked any conflict with Jon like we teased twice, Arya probably wasn’t the most poetic person to kill him either but GoT seldom did poetic deaths (Joffrey, Cersei, Euron). While the Long Night had exemplary deaths like Theon, Lyanna, Jorah and Beric, the Night King fell among the ranks of Melisandre and Edd in terms of meh deaths. The Long Night should’ve been a bigger bloodbath than it was, half the Dothraki somehow survived remember, we didn’t get to see Ghost fight at all either, no giant spiders, a lot of the tension was lost with the way some fight scenes were filmed; it was too easy to read between the lines and not enough characters had any true ‘oh god this person could die’ scenes.

7 - Resolution for the Characters we didn’t See and Plots unresolved With so much funding and finality in the show, there felt like there could’ve been more stuff that could’ve been resolved; what was the Quaith’s prophecy about? What really happened with the Doom of Valyria? Why does Dragonglass and Valyrian steel kill White Walkers? What is Daario doing after Dany died? Were the Faceless Men really that okay with letting Arya wander around knowing their skillset? Nobody hired them to help in the war either. What happened to the remnants of that warlock dude who stole the baby dragons, they sent one scorpion and that’s it, what happens with the Little Birds now that they’re leaderless? Who was Azor Ahai? What were the spirals about? There are a lot of questions the show kinda just, ignored.

6 - The Mad Queen So, Dany going from ‘I’ll stop if they surrender’ to ‘Burn them fucking all’ was abrupt for many, the majority of fans were not ready or willing to accept turning on their Kaleesi in just one episode. While I could see the conclusion coming from being jumped, losing another ‘child’ and her closest friend as well as her new boyfriend being her nephew and a legitimate threat to her legitimacy despite already pledging fealty, Dany’s descent could’ve used more time, and less naivety. While the death of the dragon was a huge shock, the idiocy fell on Dany in thinking that Cersei would play fair and wouldn’t try to occupy Dragonstone while she abandoned it. There also fell inconsistency when the same fleet and rows of Scorpion crossbows suddenly got Stormtrooper aim during ‘The Bells’. Euron is a renowned sailor, he ruined a Dornish fleet in a previous season, he may be an annoying bastard but you have to treat his naval tactics with a bit more respect - and make Dany less stupid with Cersei doing Cersei things. A lot of people definitely needed more time in buying the idea that Dany had lost her cool and that she blamed all of Westeros to justify burning everyone unashamedly.

5 - Proper Redemption We all know who we’re talking about. Jaime, Jaime, Jaime. In the end he just proved Olenna’s point didn’t he? And his turn away from redemption was only to serve as an example point for Tyrion to use to convince Jon to kill Dany. Jaime didn’t have to live, but he didn’t have to die rushing to Cersei’s rescue, or even due to Euron stabbing him. If anything Jaime should’ve died with some Honour, to be the inverse of Ned as he was presented in Season 1.

4 - My Lady does not have to mean M’Lady This is probably the most selfish ones of my 10 but as a shipper at my very heart and soul I wanted one, at least one, ship to survive this entire turmoil and Gendry and Arya were that couple. We almost had it as well, but then for some mad reason D&D decided that Gendry, despite literally saying that “none of it will be worthwhile if you’re not with me”, stayed in Storm’s End. Arya’s character endgame was right in her venturing off not being bound by the fact that she’s a noble, but Gendry spent a lot of time not caring that he was of Kingsblood to basically being his Father’s son. He’ll rule Storm’s End, marry some woman to have kids, but he’ll still have fallen into the same pit as King Robert did. It would’ve been much more satisfying and hopeful if Gendry abandoned the titles and land he never wanted or needed to accompany someone he loves and who loves him back on an adventure into the unknown. She’s not a ‘lady’ if she’s only marrying a blacksmith and love is the death of duty.

3 - Sansa is NOT Smart (and gets what she actually deserves) Right. So I really, really didn’t like Sansa. Like, I get it, she got held hostage by the Lannisters, watched her father get beheaded, got accused of murder, learned that her brother and mother died, watched the guy who fancied her mother and kissed her kill her aunt and then got effectively sold to an abuser in an arranged marriage. But Sansa is not the smartest player in the game, it was annoying that they tried to portray her as one, she had one idea that anyone could’ve told you ‘don’t be stupid against Ramsay Bolton’. She spent all of Season 8 mainly giving side eye like a petty bitch, completely trying to undermine Dany despite the two being very very similar (remember Dany was raped, sold off in an arranged marriage and watched family members get killed too) to the point where she was conspiring for Jon to usurp her. And in reality she took her ball and left, she was so pissy that the leaders didn’t pick her to be Queen of Westeros that she literally pointed out her own brother’s infertility, claimed that the North wouldn’t bow to a monarch, then declared herself Queen. Hide the ‘Yas Queen’ goggles for a sec, this wasn’t empowering she was throwing her own brother under the bus because she wanted to be queen, and she learned far too much from Littlefinger and Cersei’s playbook to actually be a just one. The North is allowed to be an independent nation, but Sansa’s ‘victory’ was more earned by virtue of a lot of shit happened to her than her actually demonstrating qualities to be queen.

2 - Bran Stark can’t come to the Phone right now... While we’re on the subject of Stark children not being fit rulers, Bran. What a cockamamie decision that was. I was 100% behind the destruction of the Iron Throne, but the chorus of laughter with a democratic rule was a bit of a slap in the face. Of all the choices though, Bran had to be near the bottom, it felt completely unearned that he spent literal seasons disconnecting from the world even to the point where he told Meera and Sam that Bran Stark is no longer here anymore only for Bran Stark to magically resurface when a crown is in waiting. I think it defeats the whole Three Eyed Raven thing too, the guy isn’t really one for the people, which is the problem every other ruler before him failed at. If you can’t pick a just person to lead, then why not a council instead? Just using Bran was a poor and messy decision.

1 - THE MOTHERFUCKING VALONQUAR One of the few expectations across all of Game of Thrones was the wondering over whether Cersei was gonna get what’s coming to her, the Maggy the Frog prophecy was going along quite well up until the Valonquar bit, where the younger sibling that was going to choke the life out of her was: bricks. BRICKS! Of all the long-winded prophecy foreshadowings to drop this one was the worst, Cersei (and Jaime) died in underwhelming, thoughtless fashion, the lack of fanfare on killing off one of the best and most ‘love to hate’ villains in the show only cemented the fact that the finale was not able to live up to the hype. True, most of these are small changes, but it’s worth remembering that there was some good coming out of the final season and it was the lack of those little things and attention to detail that led to the season ending on an underwhelming note.

We did however get a good ton of memes out of it, and at work a long-winded discussion on who should get the ‘winner’ 5-points (compared to the 1 correct points) since we had technically agreed that the 5 points goes to “whoever correctly guesses who sits on the Iron Throne” XD I still can’t believe I was right in Drogon melting the throne though that was one in a million

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raywritesthings · 4 years

Text

Still Believing

My Writing Fandom: Arrow Characters: Oliver Queen, Laurel Lance, Sebastian Blood, Slade Wilson Pairing: Laurel Lance/Oliver Queen (Pre-Relationship) Summary: Oliver isn't quite as quick to dismiss Laurel's accusations against Sebastian Blood and learns the truth about the alderman's allegiances as a result, forcing him to change his approach towards the woman he loves. *Can be read on my AO3 or FFN, links are in bio*

Oliver sat on a roof, watching the front of Sebastian Blood’s campaign office, and thanked his luck that Digg had gone home early to watch AJ for Carly. He knew exactly what the other man would be saying about his choice to monitor his recently made friend in light of the revelation about Officer Daily only hours ago at the Starling City Cannery. But he wasn’t quite as ready as everyone else to give up Laurel’s hunch just yet.

There was too much that didn’t make sense. Blood’s missing file, the fact that the Man in the Skull Mask had kidnapped Laurel after her accusations against Blood and the fact that he’d abruptly gone so public after weeks of Oliver’s fruitless questions and searching.

Daily being the man underneath the mask was just convenient. Too convenient, and it answered nothing about where the mirakuru was and who had supplied the recipe. It smacked of a cover-up, a fall guy.

Hadn’t he and Diggle pulled the same move only last year? Suspicions got a little too close and he arranged for Digg to go out as the Hood. Their plan had gone off without the complication of Diggle dying from it, of course, but the principle was the same; make everyone including the person accusing him think they were wrong, even when they were right.

Laurel herself had compared Oliver and Sebastian only recently, saying how she wasn’t quite sure she knew the real them. And she wasn’t exactly wrong in Oliver’s case, so why would she feel the same about Sebastian unless it was true? Particularly when Oliver thought he knew what she’d been feeling regarding his newest friend.

“I will take care of Laurel,” the alderman had said, and Oliver had felt something off about it, hadn’t he? That wasn’t a blind spot. That was gut instinct, the kind he had honed on the island to warn him when he was in danger. Only it hadn’t been about him this time, it had been Laurel.

She’d been well and truly taken care of, hadn’t she? Discredited, fired, and forced to kill. If Daily had been the one behind it all, raiding her apartment for the drugs she’d taken would have been enough to silence her. Why even risk his life?

Oliver knew Laurel wasn’t in a good space right now, that most were willing to dismiss her as an unreliable witness. She needed help, but if Daily wasn’t really the Man in the Skull Mask then she and countless others were still in danger. He owed it to her and the people of this city to be certain beyond a doubt that Sebastian didn’t still have some role to play.

Down on the street, there was movement as Sebastian left his campaign office with three other men in tow. They got into a car driven by a fourth man that was parked out front and pulled away from the curb. Oliver quickly descended from the roof to his bike stowed in an alley and followed at a safe distance.

It would be easier if Felicity were on the comms to follow Sebastian’s car on CCTV, but she likely quietly agreed with Digg, so Oliver couldn’t involve either of them until he had proof. It was a good thing he was practiced at tailing the old fashioned way.

Sebastian’s car pulled up outside an otherwise unremarkable office building, and he and his entourage entered it. Almost all the lights were out in the building, so it was easy to see just where they might be headed for. Oliver made his way around the building, onto the roof, and rappelled down between windows, staying out of sight flush against the brick.

He stopped his descent when he was level with the office still lit with a single lamp and only managed to make out Sebastian’s voice because the man shouted with such clear relief.

“It's done! They think it was all Daily. He sacrificed himself for our cause.”

So it had been a setup after all. Laurel hadn’t been wrong. But then, was Sebastian truly the Man in the Skull Mask, or was he merely reporting back to the real one?

Oliver heard the low murmur of a voice he could not quite make out, yet something about its timbre sent a shiver down his spine. The next thing he heard was the unsheathing of a sword.

Several gasps and grunts of pain followed, bodies hitting the floor. Oliver chanced just the briefest look and nearly froze at the sight.

Slade.

It couldn’t be real. He flattened himself against the brick again, willing himself to stop seeing ghosts. It couldn’t be Slade in there mercilessly slaughtering the men Sebastian had brought along with him. Slade was dead. Had to be.

Yet his one-time friend’s voice continued to taunt him through the glass. “Your incompetence has now cost you four lives, alderman. Fail me again, and yours will be the fifth.”

It couldn’t be a hallucination. Hallucinations didn’t cause real damage, kill real people. Hallucinations didn’t provide a radical alderman with a sample of the mirakuru that he could turn into a new batch for a new legion of super soldiers. The pieces were all falling into place now, and he was left feeling frightened and a fool.

He should have snapped his old friend’s neck when he’d had the chance, even if the thought roiled his stomach now. How many lives had already been lost because he hadn’t?

Oliver heard heavy footfalls and no more because he fled. If it was Slade, and he caught Oliver here—

What did it matter? He was already caught. Slade had gotten into his city under his nose and begun an operation. One that included Sebastian Blood becoming mayor and Laurel being silenced.

His blood ran cold. Laurel. Slade knew better than any just how much she meant to Oliver. He could have had her killed at the cannery if he’d wanted. Which could only mean he had something worse planned.

Oliver stopped in another alley some streets away, struggling to draw breath. He didn’t know what to do, how to keep her safe. He needed to keep his distance and throw Slade off his game… unless that was what he wanted.

Sebastian had just put Laurel through the last forty-eight hours clearly on Slade’s orders. Slade wanted Oliver to not trust Laurel, to withdraw from her and leave her on her own. What better way to make sure she was unprotected?

Even at her best, Laurel was no match for Slade or a man enhanced with mirakuru. Oliver wasn’t always confident enough to say he was. And Laurel was nowhere near her best these days. He needed to keep her close.

He could visit her as the Arrow, let her know that she had been right, and then… what happened then? Would Laurel want to try and find more evidence? If he told her he would take care of the situation, would she even listen? She’d be more likely to go out there on her own than to just take his word for it. What was the word of a faceless man, a stranger?

Every instinct rebelled against the conclusion his mind was drawing. Laurel wasn’t supposed to be part of this side of things. She was supposed to be safe. Yet even thinking that, he could see that wasn’t the reality. The reality was Laurel was mired in all kinds of danger, from Slade to Sara’s League, and all he had succeeded in was keeping her ignorant of it.

Could he really do it? Change everything about his approach for over a year and try a new way? There was every chance she would never forgive him, but a greater chance that she would come out of this alive.

Oliver swallowed down his fear and nerves and changed directions, taking his bike further downtown instead of back towards the base.

---

Laurel dragged her feet as she entered her apartment, leaving all the lights off as she set her things down and settled on the couch. She did not have the desire to do anything but sit in the dark with her own thoughts and failures.

How could she have been so wrong? Everything had felt like it was pointing at Sebastian; his mother’s confession and subsequent death, the missing file, just the sense of unease she got around him, like there was so much more to his vision for the city he wasn’t sharing. Like Malcolm before him, she thought she could sense an undercurrent of rage to his passionate rhetoric.

Maybe she’d just wanted to be able to unmask the mastermind before it was too late, since none of them had managed it last year. Maybe she was just balking at anyone getting too close to her right now, and she’d made up some reason in her head for why she shouldn’t get close to Sebastian after all. Maybe she was just a useless addict like her father and everyone else thought she was.

How had it come to this? She’d just wanted the pain to dull a little, not to question her own perceptions of her life. Why had she been so… weak?

She wanted to tell herself that this was the wakeup call. Time to get back up and put an end to all this spiralling. But what did she have to really make an effort for anymore? No job, barely anything like friends, a disappointed father, a wreck of a love life… was there a point to get better, when there wasn’t much of a better she could expect in return?

Her lights already being off, just the slightest click of the latch on the window was the only warning she had. Laurel staggered up and back, reaching wildly for the desk drawer. Where was — had they taken her gun? “Damnit!”

“It’s just me,” the Hood’s modulated voice spoke, and Laurel felt her breath release as she slowly turned back around. He was standing there, bow strapped to his back and both hands held up. Her head slowly shook side to side.

“I didn’t think you’d come see me, after what I did.”

“You really think I can judge you for killing a man in a fight?”

If she were in a better mood, she might have smirked at that. He had a point. “No, but… I was wrong.”

“You weren’t.”

Laurel froze. “What do you mean?”

Slowly, he walked closer. “I took the liberty of following Sebastian Blood tonight. He met with an associate and told him that Daily played his part in their plan. He was just a decoy.”

Her fingers trembled. A part of her wanted to deny it — how could Daily be that fanatically loyal to a man or a cause that he would throw his own life down just to discredit one lone drunk? Just what could Sebastian be building? A part of her ran both hot and cold at once. How dare they take away what little she’d had to keep going for just to take away her voice!

“Who’s his associate?” If she knew that, she’d know more about what Sebastian was trying to do, how to stop it.

But the Arrow hesitated. “Someone dangerous.”

“Oh.” Laurel’s eyes closed. She should have seen this coming. “You’re saying goodbye again.” It was what everyone did, wasn’t it?

“No.”

She wondered if she had heard that right and opened her eyes. This close, she could see the Arrow’s mouth twist in a conflicted frown, one that seemed so achingly familiar if only she could just think straight for a minute.

“This man knows me. He knows who matters to me. No amount of removing myself from your life will change that.”

Laurel’s stomach did a strange sort of flip flop. She had always maintained there was nothing more to her relationship with the Arrow than a mutual desire to see justice done, at least whenever they were on good terms. To hear him say she mattered when she’d been doubting it herself… But she needed to keep focused.

“What are you saying?” She prompted him, hoping it sounded at least somewhat gentle. She didn’t want to spook him.

“I’m saying that I don’t know a better way to keep you safe than to tell you the truth. And I’m sorry.” There was the slightest beep of some kind of device, and then he reached up and pulled down his hood.

Even in the dark of her apartment, he was unmistakable. Laurel’s back hit the shelf behind her with a gasp, a trembling hand going to her temples.

“Ollie?”

He stared at her, his eyes still shadowed by the mask he wore. He said nothing, seeming to realize she needed a moment.

She needed more than that. She needed a drink or something because she- she’d hunted him. She’d blamed him for Tommy’s death no matter how much of a projection of her own guilt it had been. He’d probably thought he deserved it, too, and yet he’d still saved her from the Dollmaker. He’d still shown up when she’d called for help about her suspicions towards Sebastian. Because he still cared.

So much of the vigilante’s actions became clear to her in that moment with just that realization. All the times she had wondered why her, or what he really thought of her, why he seemed to want to work together and yet held her at arm’s length.

She reached out now, slowly, and he let her touch his shoulder. She needed to feel the leather of the suit he wore, the hard muscle underneath, to know he was solid and real. Before she knew it, she was hugging him.

“Thank you,” she mumbled, and wasn’t fully sure what she was even referring to. All the times he’d saved her? Everything he’d done for the city? Finally just telling her what was going on?

He brought his arms around her slowly, and his cheek rested on the top of her head for a moment that stretched between them. She wasn’t sure what happened when either of them moved, and a part of her didn’t really want to. She felt safe and warm in a way she hadn’t for all that time since the Undertaking, and she didn’t want it to go away.

“You’re really okay with this?” He wondered aloud.

She shrugged in his hold. “I always knew the Arrow was someone under that hood, and that he wasn’t choosing to share that with me. I guess now I can see why you had a reason.” He’d been unwilling to take risks with her safety last year after Vanch, not because he didn’t think she was cut out for it, but because she meant more to him than just being a good lawyer. She was important to somebody in this world.

Of course, her tired and dazed mind eventually remembered why he was even telling her this now. Laurel slowly tilted her head back to look at him. “Who is it that Sebastian’s working with and why does it worry you this much?”

She watched him swallow, eyes not quite meeting hers. “His name is Slade Wilson, and he’s… someone I knew on the island. Someone I thought was dead.”

Laurel shivered. “Was he one of the people who tortured you?” It was one of those things she couldn’t help recalling every so often, even though she hated thinking about it. About the pain he endured for all those years.

Oliver hesitated, then nodded. “For some of it. Before that, we were friends. And I… I showed him this.”

He let her go, and Laurel hugged her arms to herself at the loss of contact, watching as he withdrew something from one of the pockets of his suit. Her heart jumped into her throat.

It was the photograph. The silly little wallet-sized photograph her dad had gotten copies made of after her college graduation. He’d said it mattered more than high school anyway. Laurel had rolled her eyes at the time, but snuck a copy to take down with her to the docks, to give as a favor to the boy who’d captured her heart.

And he still had it. Had both, really. Through a shipwreck and five years of who knew what Hell, he had hung onto that photo. She’d never realized he would’ve wanted to keep it.

“Slade knows what you mean to me, Laurel, and what he’s here for is more than just to plot with Sebastian. He wants revenge, and he will use anything and anyone I care about to get to me. But most especially you. I’m so sorry.”

It was like something had snapped in her, the jagged broken bits of her fitting back into place, and she could breathe again. Could think and feel like a normal person again. Her lonely mess of a life had some sense to it at last, and she felt more like the woman she remembered herself to be. So Laurel shook her head.

“I haven’t been hurt yet, Ollie. Yes, I’ve lost my job, but that wasn’t because of you. It was because of what I was doing to uncover Sebastian’s secrets. It would’ve happened whether this Slade Wilson was in town or not.” She had to wonder just where and how Sebastian fit into this revenge scheme Oliver was talking about, but that was something they could figure out. “They probably think I’ve been taken care of, so I’m safe.”

“I don’t know for how long,” he insisted miserably. “Slade will come after you.”

“Then I’ll defend myself.”

He shook his head. “He’s stronger than anyone I know, Laurel. Including me. And…” he paused, looking uncomfortable, before saying, “you’re not well.”

She looked down at herself. The thin, frail arms. Her clothes that seemed to swallow up her slight form. Had she really let it get this far? Some of the fear and shame from before when her father had turned his back on her in the interrogation room welled back up within her, stinging her eyes, but she pushed it down.

“I can get better.”

“Really?” He sounded afraid to hope. She could relate to that feeling.

“Really. I- I thought I was alone, that you and my dad were just acting out of obligation or something. That I’d ruined everything with the Arrow… I didn’t think anyone could still believe in me.”

He’d followed Sebastian just to prove her right. He’d seen some kind of worth in pursuing it, no matter how messed up and irrational of a person she seemed to everyone else.

“I don’t want to let that down, and I don’t want to just lay down and die for some maniac with a grudge match against you. I’ll get better,” she promised.

His shoulders relaxed with a small smile, and he pulled her close again. “Thank God.” His lips pressed to her forehead for a breath.

“Ollie…”

“Yeah?”

Laurel didn’t speak. She wanted to ask just what she did mean to him that had him so worried about this Slade Wilson, but it didn’t feel like the right time. This was so new, and she had so much work to do to get back into a good place for herself. So she just held his forearms a little tighter.

“Thank you.”

She wasn’t sure how long they stood like that, just breathing in the quiet space between them. It was one of those rare moments in her life she didn’t want to end. But she was starting to have trouble keeping her eyes open.

“You should get some rest,” Oliver said, as if reading her thoughts.

“So should you. You’re the one with a job to go to in the morning.”

“You’re gonna find something,” he said immediately. “I’ll help.”

She actually believed him. The Oliver who had returned from the island seemingly full of good intentions but empty promises had only been half the story. Now that she knew what lengths he went to for this city, she thought she could start to trust him again.

They pulled away from each other, Laurel reaching out one last time to cup his cheek, her thumb rubbing the edge of the mask he was still wearing. “You’re okay now?”

“I don’t know if I’ll be okay until Slade’s been stopped,” he admitted. “But I feel much better than I did. Thank you.”

She smiled. It had been a while since she’d felt like she could actually help someone. It felt good. “Goodnight, Ollie.”

“Goodnight, Laurel.”

She walked to her hallway but paused there and watched as he put the hood back up and left through her apartment window, stealing across rooftops into the night. The vigilante; her oldest friend; the man she — despite telling herself she shouldn’t — loved. Life was starting to make sense again.

She would call her dad in the morning and ask him what she needed to do to get herself out of this path she’d gone down the same as him. Just picturing the relief it would give him had her smiling. She could be more than a burden or an annoyance to people. She was more than a bunch of failures.

Those thoughts echoing in her head like a mantra, Laurel turned in for the night, re-determined to take on the world come the morning.

#lauriver #laurel x oliver #oliver queen #laurel lance #arrow #green arrow #black canary #my writing

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spy-der-woman · 4 years

Text

Bravado

Summary:

Jessica (Spyder Woman) is brought in by Hydra to recount her latest interaction with Bucky Barnes that occurred in the black of Kabukichō.

Thank you for reading!

Word Count: 2,518

https://archiveofourown.org/works/22736059

Previous Parts (can be read in any order):

Clair De Lune

Waiting Game

Standing in front of a two-way mirror, Jessica pulled at the stitch on her top lip. A little twinge of pain made her grit her teeth. The swelling around her mouth had gone down, but the black and blue still remained. Last time when she looked at herself in this mirror, she had a deep cut just above her right eye. Before that, she was picking shards of glass out of her cheek. The small interrogation room (or as she called it, “The Time Out Room”), was a familiar place for Jessica. However, to her credit, she had gone almost a full three months without being thrown in there. A personal best.

A loud beep came from the intercom on top of the metal table in the middle of the room, “Jessica, can you please take a seat.”

She did as told. Back straight, feet forward.

The door in the corner opened up, and a short nameless, faceless man with a pile of papers walked in. He laid out photographs, marked-up documents, and a tape recorder on the table before taking his seat.

Jessica immediately let her rigid posture go, “Is she not coming?”

The man didn’t look up at her as he placed a new tape into the machine, “The Madame is away. She has, however— ”

“I need to see her soon.”

“Given me a set of questions— ”

“I need to speak to her.”

“To ask you about what happened in Kabukichō recently.”

“I need to— ”

“And you will.” He pressed the record button. He slid the photograph farthest to the left forward. “When was the last time you saw the Winter Soldier?”

Jessica took a photograph into her hands. It was fuzzy, but you could make out her leaning against a trash can as he stood above her, moving the hair out of her face.

“The last time I saw James Buchanan “Bucky” Barnes— the Winter Soldier— was at the middle or the end of August.”

“Was it the middle or the end?”

“End. It hadn’t rained in a long time. If you are going to want to be specific on the details for your report, I should tell you that this was the last time I spoke to James Buchanan “Bucky” Barnes. I had seen him a few times before out of the corner of my eye in Moscow, Budapest, London, New York, all the places you have sent me.”

“You failed to inform us of these ‘sightings’ during your debriefings.”

“You didn’t ask. This was the first time we had talked since Barnes kept me locked up in that shed for three weeks.”

“The shed, you still have no recollection of where it was located.”

“My eyes were swollen shut. Beat me within an inch of my life. Barely escaped. Pitch blackout. Can I continue?”

“Please.”

///

One— two— three four— five men down on the ground in a circle. I was in the middle of them. It was night time, and we were behind an abandoned bathhouse. They were low-level street guys. Easy, still good practice. One of them managed to bust my top lip open with the back of his pistol, as you can tell.

I went and pulled my knife out of the guy in front of me. He was an inch shorter than me, but build wide. He made a good shield. His blood was still warm. Sticky too, because when I pulled my fingers apart, there were little strings between my index and middle finger.

I remember when I looked up at the sky, there still weren’t any stars. I don’t think I have seen stars in any part of Tokyo. There is too much noise for there to be any. This city is always loud. Day, night, it doesn’t matter; there is always sound. Always a car honking, people talking, news reports blaring off the side of buildings. It used to give me such a bad headache. Even to the point where all my other senses would get fuc—messed up. So I have learned to hear underneath the sound. And underneath all that sound, I could hear breathing that was just as low and slow as mine, as you taught us to do.

Admittedly, him being anywhere nearby wasn’t my first initial thought. I know I said I had “seen” Barnes a couple of times since the shed, still it had been awhile. I think around six months was the last time I saw him when you sent me on my second mission to Paris. My gut reaction was that the breathing was coming from one of the very dead men around me, and I just started bashing their heads in with the back of my boot.

Speaking of which, I’m going to need new boots.

Back of my heel was right above the fourth guy when Barnes came out of the black, between the bathhouse and a hotel. He had cut his hair and shaved his face. Clean-cut, not a bad look on him.

“I think you got-em, kid.”

The haircut didn’t change that he was still the same asshole.

“Jessica.”

My adrenaline was still pretty high at that point. Getting charged back up wasn’t a problem at all. The green glow from my hands stayed focused on Barnes as he paced from left to right. He joked about me acting hostile and that he met no harm. I don’t know if he genuinely forgot that the first time we met/talked he punched me in the face and kept me locked up in a shed for three weeks— which I repeat a shed I don’t remember the location of— but if he was going to play dumb then so was I.

I asked him what he was doing here, and he made a comment about the color of my suit. He thought that red was a bold choice for an undercover agent.

I told him to answer me.

He didn’t.

Instead, he started reading off the headlines that the newspapers ran after the Toranomon Hills fire. I don’t know what the point of that was. As if I wasn’t there, as if I don’t know the things I’ve done. If anything, it just made me mad. I kept repeating myself, and he wouldn’t answer. I asked him to shut the fuc—stop talking. He just kept talking and talking and talking that I hit my breaking point.

“All a little heroic. Don’t ya think, kid?”

I let myself go. Shot Barnes with that venom blast.

However, you have trained us all too well. He dodged it no problem.

I charged up again.

He moved closer to me, “People are watching you.”

“Your people, you mean.”

“More than them. You keep your books balanced, but—”

“But what?”

“I’m worried about you.”

There is something pretty funny about that phrase to me, “worried about you” I feel like I hear it a lot. I mean back when I was in the shed Barnes didn’t say that to me word for word, he hinted at it. And when you guys took me in, one of the first things Madame ever said to me was she was worried about my well being. Which is nice to hear, gives me a flicker of warmth. It’s just I don’t think I entirely understand that if I cause concern, then why did Barnes take so long to step out of the black or why haven’t I spoken to the Madame directly in almost a year.

Then again, it’s much easier to play along because I have learned that the fewer questions you ask, the more people trust you, and the quicker they leave you alone.

Barnes kept inching forward, “Jessica.”

“Don’t Jessica me.”

I really do hate that.

“You’re going to hurt yourself, kid.” He pointed at my hands.

I was so angry, I didn’t notice that most of the suit had burned away at that point. The skin on my hands, especially at the fingertips, had started to turn black.

This means, along with new boots, I need a new suit. This latest one you guys have made for me worked great for the most part. Comfortable, flexible, good fit. Just need to find a material that can withstand prolonged exposure to bioelectric energy. I’m okay. Few new scars never hurt anybody. Still, I’m not a fan of the smell of burnt flesh. It stays in your nose too long.

I hit the brick wall of exhaustion pretty hard at that point. I guess while you guys work on a new suit, I will have to work on my pacing. I almost fell to the ground, but Barnes got me at the last second. He propped me up on the trashcan, as you can see in this photo.

“The suit?” he asked again.

“I like the color red.”

That got him to laugh. He told me that wasn’t what he meant and that it was much different from my last one.

“The last one?” Upped my voice an octave. Gets them every time.

“Remember? I said I would be keeping an eye on you.”

“And?”

“What you did back in Budapest? With just a knife?”

“Thank you.”

I have to admit, it was pretty good work for just a girl with a switchblade.

He asked if I knew the men I had just killed. I didn’t, honest. I had been in the neighborhood, swinging around, when I saw them harassing these two girls, sisters it looked like, who were on their way home. I didn’t plan on doing anything at first. Men say awful things every day, just these men started getting a little too close. When the short one, the one I used as a shield, tugged on the skirt of the younger girl, she started crying. I jumped down from the roof of the bathhouse. Killed them all.

The men, I mean.

Barnes asked about what happened to the little girls if they got home safe and sound. I shrugged my shoulder and told him that I think they did. They were gone by the time the first bullet rang out.

“You think?”

He didn’t sound all too happy with my answer.

“I hope.”

That answer wasn’t any better.

Barnes then moved the hair out of my face and said, “They got to you, huh?”

They, as in you, Hydra.

You know—pardon my language here because I know Madame is big on manners— I don’t know what the literal fuck that bold statement was supposed to mean. I told him back in the shed what my deal was. Did I like that those guys were touching those girls? No. Did I also have a new suit to test out to make sure it would be able to function in case I-me-Jessica-Spyder Woman was in actual danger? Yes. And that’s it. I wanted to snap his arm in two when he said that to me. Especially touching me, gently tucking my hair behind my ear as if that was going to add any sentimental value to him being a self-righteous asshole.

Unfortunately, I’m not strong enough to break vibranium. Maybe that is something we can work on.

“Do you feel anything at all?” Barnes asked me. Bent down to the ground so that we could make eye contact.

The key to playing along is to drop hints of honesty. I told him I felt something, but killing people or saving them all feels the same. Barnes called that indifference. I say I don’t know their names.

I asked if he remembered all the names of the people he hurt. He didn’t. Asked him if he remembered all the names of the people who are still alive because of him. He didn’t. You want to know why? Because there is no possible way, you ever could. Earth mightiest heroes? To who?

Barnes looked out to the street, where all the pretty lights and people were, then back to the five dead men that were behind him. He took a deep breath, “Well, then point of doing anything at all?”

It was a fair question to ask. The only answer I had was something that I was told a long time ago. When I was just a kid, long before you guys ever found me.

“Did you know that the female is always the deadliest in the species.”

“They are?”

“And you want to know how they got that way? They evolved.”

///

The nameless, faceless man adjusted his glasses as he finished up writing done a shorthand account of Jessica’s story. The tape recorder was still going; however, every document needed a backup record.

Jessica put the photograph back on the table, “And that was the end of that.”

The man dropped his pen mid-sentence, “That’s it?”

“Well, he asked me again about the Avengers as a sort of last-ditch effort.” Jessica pushed the scattered papers on the table together to make one neat pile. “Said no thank you. Hail Hydra and went our separate ways.”

“You didn’t attempt to subdue James Buchanan Barnes as you did in the shed. Use your pheromones, venom blast, or any of your other extensive training.”

“I know my story was long, but please remember how I told you at the start that I killed five men and had destroyed most of my suit in the process. The answer is no. We went our separate ways.”

“And he didn’t—”

“My name is Jessica, not James.” She stood up and took her red motorcycle jacket off the back of the chair. She slipped it over her shoulders and gave herself a look in the two-way mirror, “Can I go home now? I don’t have anything else to say.”

“I want to ask one more question. To make sure our reports are as accurate as possible. You stated earlier, ‘I told him back in the shed what my deal was.’ Can you please explain what you mean by this. What is your deal?”

For a moment, Jessica could feel the cold winter air on the tip of her nose, along with snowflakes on her cheeks. “Seems nitpicky.”

“To be honest with you, Madame is starting to question your loyalty.”

“She can ask me herself then.” Jessica rushed towards the door.

“Jessica, please answer the question.”

The air on her arms stood up straight. On the other side of the two-way mirror, Jessica could hear the click of a gun.

“Answer the question. The tape is almost out.”

Secure my own survival.

Jessica relaxed her shoulders, taking in a sharp breath. She placed her fingers on the door handle, “Complete the mission at any and all costs.”

The man stopped the tape recorder. He finished up a few more scribbles in his notebook before closing it. “Exactly. With off the record with instruction for Madame herself, the next encounter you have with Barnes or anyone from the Avengers, you will join if asked. Understood?”

Jessica stood still as she heard the flick of a finger on the trigger, “Understood.”

“Hail Hydra.”

Jessica let go of the door.

#into the spider verse #spiderwoman #spider woman #oneshot #marvel fanfiction #marvel one shot #marvel #jessica drew #hydra #Bucky Barnes #Winter Soilder #winter solider fanfiction #neo tokyo

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hufflepuffhollander · 4 years

Text

fire and gasoline (mob!tom series) ch. 1: new vendetta

a/n | wooo buckle in this is a wild ride 😼 and pls share w the world! i’m proud of this one!

synopsis | Your family runs a sect of the british mafia. Tom Holland is the son of the mob leader in your rival gang. You’ve been groomed to be at each other’s throats for as long as you can remember, and a chance run-in after over a decade of feuding and secrecy has you questioning everything you thought you knew.

cw | mob!tom au. enemies to lovers. language, angst, death threats, objectification, sexual tension, and lots of spit. 3.1k words.

read the prologue, join the taglist :)

Roxy’s was your spot- it always had been. The dark alleyway entrance, the smoky air inside that concealed who you truly were, the faceless regulars that just knew to leave you be- it was everything you could want in a local bar. So, instead of somewhere a little cheerier, you chose here; instead of a glimmering club with strobe effects to blind you and music loud enough to burst your eardrums, you decided to spend your birthday where you knew you could melt into the blackness of the night and live mess-free, even if it was just for a few hours.

You had just gotten your second round of drinks with a few friends, your heels clicking from across the room as you wandered over to your table with freshly topped off shot glasses. A brand new, skin-tight black dress paired with electric blue heels adorned you, and the birthday glow radiating across your skin had you looking and feeling like absolutely nothing could bring you down. You were celebrating, you had just landed a major deal with a supplier to your casino; and better yet, you hadn’t heard from the Hollands in weeks. Since their failed attempt at taking out your father during a high-profile event, they had been lying low, full of shame. A recent victory for your family in the never-ending turf war with the Hollands? Not a single mention of Dom or Nikki thwarting your plans in days? Well, that was the best birthday present a girl could ask for.

You barely had time to feel the gin roll down your throat before the bar door was shoved open, bells tied in a knot overhead chiming ominously as it felt like a tornado had blown in. The room fell quiet, the punkish music on repeat seeming to mute itself. Even the smoke moving through the air was put on pause. Everyone was eyeballing the doorway, where two heavily armed young men stood rigidly; right behind them, a pale, muscular boy with the scent of his own ego radiating off him, a slick smile painted across his face. Every part of your body suddenly felt ice cold.

The boy took off his glasses, the sheer notion that he was wearing wayfarers at night making you groan, and coated the room with his gaze until it landed—and stayed—on you. You tried to avert your attention but couldn’t, as a wave of realization fell over you when he made eye contact. You knew this fuckwad. It was Tom Holland- the son of your rival mob, the boy your father always told you to imagine a target was when learning to sharpshoot...the one who had orchestrated the failed assassination of your dad. Your belly filled with a white-hot fire at the audacity he had to show his face here. Who did he think he was? What the hell was he doing on the East side? And did he know he had just walked into his own execution?

You would’ve seen it through, too, had he not been about to strike you square in the face with a curveball.

“We’re closed.” you heard Roxy spit out, not even bothering to look at the boys as she dried a glass.

“Doesn’t seem like it, babe,” Tom sneered, flashing her an insincere smile and focusing his attention back on you. “And anyway, we aren’t staying; I just came here with a message for the birthday girl.”

You fantasized about a knife appearing on the table in front of you so you could slice the little bitch to shreds for even daring to acknowledge you. But no such luck.

Tom whisked past the bar front, taking his time to saunter over towards your booth. You had bribed your security guard to let you take the night off- he was only there because of your dad’s doing, so he could breathe easier when you were out of his sight. But you hated feeling like a little kid needing to be babysat, especially tonight, when you were turning a year older, and paid him off to get doped up with a friend instead of coming with you. You were kicking yourself for that decision now, watching Tom come up to you without a hint of fear in his dark, shimmering eyes.

You hadn’t seen him since you were kids, when you had told everyone you were getting married to the cute boy you played with and exchanged candy rings with him in your backyard.

“My my, what an impressive array of barbies,” Tom laughed as he stopped in front of your table, swiping his tongue across his teeth. “any of you pretty things looking to blow this joint?”

Your few friends looked simultaneously revolted and terrified, and you knew they lived their lives too sugarcoated to witness the interaction you were about to have.

“Girls, you should leave,” you said, giving them a concerned stare, and it took them less than a second to get up and bolt. Some real friends you had.

You tried to remain composed as you turned your attention to Tom, syllables seething through your gritted teeth. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing here?”

“Aww, baby, that’s no way to greet an old friend, is it? ‘Coulda least let me wish you a happy birthday,” he sat down on the bench across from you, making you recoil into your seat. “I even have a candle you can blow, if you like.”

“Don’t flatter yourself, asshole.”

“Well someone just isn’t feeling very sentimental, hmm? You remember all those years ago, playing hide and go seek in your mansion, holding hands under the dinner table...I think I remember you having it pretty bad for me back then-”

“You must have a death wish, huh?” you cut him off, standing up and advancing towards him, but taking a step back as he stood up to meet you and towered over you menacingly. He smelled like cigar smoke and cherry aftershave and it clouded your thoughts. You’d always said you’d kill him if he ever got this close to you. Why were you faltering now when it mattered most? Your heart couldn’t keep up with your head.

“No, doll. Not tonight, and definitely not in a place like this. But I gotta admit, I was not expecting you to look so fucking good after all these years. Pop had me believing you were some kind of ugly recluse. Makes it extra difficult for me to tell you to give daddy a call before your birthday is over,” his eyes hungrily flicked over you in your dress, making your blood boil. “y’know, tell him you love him.”

“The hell are you talking about?” you reached for your purse where your pistol was lodged, but felt a cold piece of metal touch the back of your head, halting your movements.

“I wouldn’t, if I were you,” said minion #1, standing behind you with the barrel of his gun nestled into your curled hair. You swallowed nervously and felt your heart rate skyrocket. The bar seemed to have emptied out; it was just you, Tom, and the promise of death caressing your scalp, and you had nowhere to go.

“Hey, now, Harrison, there’s no need for that! y/n and I go way back,” Tom said, motioning for his friend to lower the weapon. Deeply buried flashbacks of child you linked arm in arm with child Tom flicked through your mind, memories you had suppressed long ago.

“Love,” Tom started, advancing towards you again, leaving you nowhere to go if you didn’t want gun grease staining your head. “I’m simply hinting that you may want to get out any last sentiments before we bleed him out on his crisp white sheets tonight.”

Your eyes widened in panic, and your words came out stuttered. “Y-you’re bluffing-”

“You so sure of that, baby?” He clicked his tongue against his teeth, leaning his head in so his face was only inches from yours. “You tellin’ me you know he’s safe and sound right now? Or does an itty, bitty part of you think that maybe, when his baby girl and best insurance policy went out for drinks, it left his ass dangling out in the open, just begging to get capped?”

Your nostrils flared and your teeth were clenched so hard together that you were sure they’d break, but you couldn’t move, couldn’t fight. You were stuck in the space of Tom as his cool breath violated your cheeks, suddenly picturing violent images of your family in a pool of blood.

Your eyebrows raised with each syllable you spoke, trying your best to conceal the incredible stress eating at you from the inside. “Get...the fuck...out of my face.”

Tom did something that almost made you combust then, swiping his thumb across the bottom of your chin, grinning, and blowing a smooch at you before finally drawing back. The sound of his lips smacking together lingered in your ears, like he not only had total control of you, but of all the soundwaves in the air.

“Look, I thought I was doing you a favor, giving you the heads up and all...I definitely didn’t have to. So if you wanna be an ungrateful little bitch about it, fine,” he stepped back, sitting down in the booth again and casually propping his feet up on the seat opposite. “don’t call him. I don’t fucking care.”

With a path to the door finally freed, you began to calculate your next move in your head, but Tom seemed to have violated your thoughts, too.

“Nuh-uh,” he tsked, looking off to the door and giving a nod as minion #2 locked it into place and stood with his arms crossed in front of it like the world’s least intimidating bouncer. “You really think we’d come all this way to tell you we’re about to kill daddy and then just let you, what, leave? Run home to his rescue?” he scoffed at the mere thought, and his worker bees in black laughed along with him. Tom gave you an infinitely objectifying once-over. “Like you’d make it that far in those heels.”

“I’d like to see them off,” one of his men said, prompting Tom to violently curse at him.

“Don’t you fucking dare talk about her like that, Harry. She’s not yours.” He was acting like some protective owner of you, which only made you angrier as you felt a dull electricity appear in your stomach.

The alcohol already in your system mixed with the adrenaline coursing through your veins made you feel fiery, out of control, erratic. You weren’t sure if you wanted to lunge at him or cry, the sting of worry pinpricking your eyelids as Tom’s smirk stayed put.

“What do you want?” you resigned, looking down and away from him, leaning against the wall behind you for support. You didn’t want to cave, but you couldn’t help it- you were paralyzed, fight or flight response warring with itself.

Tom shrugged, remaining nonchalant. “Just bragging rights, really,” he picked up an arm and ran his fingers through his tousled hair, his oversized platinum watch catching the light as he did it.

You were able to regain some composure as you responded, remembering who you were, knowing that your family could hold its own. You took a few paces forward in an attempt reclaim your pride. “Slim chance. You’d never be able kill him anyway, you pathetic excuse of a television criminal,” you spat out, seeing Tom’s expression falter just enough to spur you on. “You’re not the only one who knows things, y’know, I’ve learned all about you, too. All bark and no bite. A puppy who acts tough until he gets a paper cut and cowers under the bed.” you could feel your confidence refueling your words, and narrowed your eyes. “Maybe you were intimidating as a kid, but you don’t fucking scare me now, Holland.”

Upon the callout, Tom bolted up from his seat, swiftly pulling a handheld gun out of his belt and backing you up against the wall, barrel aimed at the perfect angle to blaze a clean hole through your head. “You little-”

Thankfully, you had friends on this side of town, and Roxy always had your back.

She tore out of the back with an assault rifle twice the size of her, firing a round of warning shots into the rickety ceiling. It shook Tom’s focus enough for you to make a break for it, running and ducking behind the safety of the bar.

“You better get to leaving before I have to mop you greasy motherfuckers off my floor,” Roxy said in her thick cockney accent, looking as intimidating as you’d ever seen her. Tom sniggered and stayed put.

“You think I’m joking?” she said, aiming at the wooden boards and landing a shot barely an inch from one of his friends’ feet.

“Jesus-!” they yelped, forcing you to stifle a laugh as you watched the scene unfold.

Three very oversized men walked out from the back of the room with their own weapons of choice to back Roxy up. Seeing they’d been outnumbered, Tom retracted his gun and looked warily at his friends, grouping up to leave the bar. He saw you backed in the corner and took an extra moment to let that cocky sneer find its way back to his face, making sure to remind you why you ran in the first place.

The group walked out unscathed, leaving behind a deafening silence until Roxy looked back at you and shook you from your trance.

“Go home, babes, and make sure your family is okay.”

As you ran outside against your better judgement, eyes locked on your car parked in the alley, an abraisive pair of hands grabbed you from behind and pushed you up against the side of the building. You recognized the sickly sweet smell of cherries and knew Tom wasn’t finished with you.

He had his arm up over your head and the other on your shoulder, evidently taking in all of your features for the first time in years.

“Time did you well, didn’t it? My god, can’t believe my little kid wife grew up to be so pretty,” his eyes sparkled with a twisted, deep desire. “We’d look good together in different circumstances, hm?” His words prompted you to spit in his face.

“In your fucking dreams.”

“Ooh, a feisty little thing. I’d watch that temper of yours, y/n, you’ll make a lot of enemies talking like that,” he said in a low voice, collecting your spit from his cheek and sucking it off of his finger.

“We’re friends forever, darling. I’ll find my way back to you.” he winked at you and sauntered away into the dark. “Say hi to daddy for me.”

Your foot on the gas pedal made an indentation on the floor of the car as you sped home, tears almost blinding you from the road, making every streetlight overhead look like an abstract explosion of color. You left the ignition on as you careened into the gated entrance of your house, kicking your blue heels into the grass and sprinting inside, yelling. “Dad? Mum? Hello???”

You almost ran head first into your parents as they rushed out of the den after hearing your exasperated calls.

“y/n? What the bloody hell is going on?” your mother saw you standing shell-shocked, taking in the fact that they weren’t chopped into pieces, and pulled you into a hug as you broke out into uncontrollable sobs.

“T-they locked me in and told me they were- that you’d be dead when I got home-” you choked out in between tears, unable to calm your breathing.

Your dad gripped his tumbler of scotch with so much sudden anger that it shattered into his hand. You could see fire in his eyes. “Who? Who told you that?”

You looked up at him and said exactly what he was expecting. “The Hollands. Tom. He- he came into Roxy’s.”

“I’m going to hang that chav from his wimpy little fucking-”

“Hon, please.” your mom said sternly while motioning to you in your sorry state, making your dad’s face a little less violently red. He took a deep, ragged breath.

“Hey, sweet pea, look,” he said, tucking away a strand of hair that had fallen in your face and was clinging to your tear-streaked cheeks. “We’re okay, alright? Tonight is an ordinary night, and our security detail is the best in the city. You stop worrying and go get yourself cleaned up, mum and I have something special we want to give you.” He smiled only to steam off and slam the door to his office, most likely to make a call to get someone, anyone, that may have had a hand in tonight’s events drawn and quartered by dawn.

You came downstairs after a long, boiling hot shower that only made you seethe more at the fact that Tom had been bluffing the whole time. It had clearly just been a fear tactic, probably done for no other reason than to fuck with you on your birthday and ruin your night. He loved crafting little games like that, this being the first time he’d come to play in person—and what made you angriest is that it had worked.

“Honey, we have a gift for you,” your mom said, handing you a silver box that was much heavier than it looked. She and your dad sat on the big sofa in the den, looking at you expectantly.

“Well, open it!” she smiled.

You undid the box, hands still shaking from earlier, and found a shiny, pitch black glock with a silver inscription in its body reading “sweet pea”, the nickname your dad had given you forever ago.

“Uh, wow, I don't know what to say...” you trailed off, picking it up and turning it over in your hand. It became surprisingly weightless, feeling like it was made to fit in your palm.

“It was mine, back in the day,” your dad spoke, seeming wistful. “Had it rebuilt and shined up for my baby girl.”

“Thank you, daddy, I love it,” you said, leaning over to hug your parents. You smiled blankly as they talked to you about the gift and how special it was, nodding at their comments...but you weren’t really listening.

All you could think about was a pair of flushed lips inches from your own, an intoxicating smell lingering in your brain; and just how amazing this gun would feel in your hand right after it had burned a bullet-sized cavity into Tom Holland’s chest.

#fire and gasoline #new series #mob!tom #tom holland #tom holland imagine #tom holland blurb #tom holland fanfiction #tom holland one shot #tom holland fanfic #tom holland smut #tom holland x reader #tom holland x you #mob!tom x you #mob! tom x reader

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crimson25 · 5 years

Text

Bad dreams and a lullaby

By pamcake21

Shameless: Ian X Mickey

Note: I’ve been on an Ian and Mickey binge lately and this story has been in my brain for a while. It is a little graphic in the beginning but it’s worth a read.

Summary: Mickey has a bad dream that shakes him to his core. Ian will try anything to calm him down, but only one idea comes to mind.

It was dark. Mickey couldn’t see a thing. His head was pounding. It felt like someone hit him in the head with a pipe. He went to rub his temples but was stopped. Someone had tied him to a chair.

“What the fuck?” He said confused and angry. He looked around. It was too dark to see anything. He struggled to get out of the ropes.

“HEY! WHO THE FUCK DID THIS? GET ME OUT OF HERE!” He yelled into the dark. That’s when a light came on from the ceiling. Mickey looked around but still didn’t see anyone.

“Nice of you to join us Mr. Milkovich. It’s about time you woke up.” A voice said from behind him. Mickey didn’t recognize the voice.

“MOTHERFUCKER YOU BETTER GET ME OUT OF THIS CHAIR RIGHT NOW I SWARE TO GOD!” Mickey yelled, trying to be as intimidating as possible.

“Now why would I do that? The second I untie you you’ll beat me within an inch of my life, then you’ll leave and miss the surprise I have for you.” The man finally coming into view. Mickey didn’t know what to make of him. He was wearing all black and had a white mask with no face.

‘Why the fuck would I want a surprise from a freak like you?”

“Well I know for a fact that this surprise is very important to you. You would do anything to get it. You would even die for it… or should I say him.” He said. That’s when another light came on and in the middle of the spotlight was Ian. He was tied to a chair as well, with a gag in his mouth. It took a second for his eyes to adjust but when he saw Mickey, they went wide.

“Mickey? MICKEY!” His words came out muffled as he tried to break free. Mickey could see in his eyes that he was scared.

“Don’t worry Ian I’ll get us out of here” He said as he pulled on his ropes.

“Now why would you want to do that? The party’s just getting started.” The man snapped his fingers. Two more men dressed the same came out of the shadows wheeling a cart full of knives, a machete, a pair of bolt cutters, and a scalpel. The leader of the three picked up a knife and walked over to Mickey. Mickeys brain went into panic mode.

“I swear to god if you touch me with that thing I’m gunna-”

“You’ll what?” The man said getting in Mickeys face. ignoring the anger in Mickeys voice “You can’t even get out of those rope. Besides, these toys aren’t for you…. they’re for him.” He said pointing the knife in Ian’s direction. Mickeys eyes widened.

“YOU STAY THE FUCK AWAY FROM HIM!” He shouted.

“Oh sorry little puppy but I have my own plans.” He said as he walked over to Ian.

“YOU LEAVE HIM THE FUCK ALONE YOU PIECE OF SHIT!” Mickey shouted but his threats fell on deaf ears. The man walked around Ian, examining his body as Mickey shouted out threats.

“I think I’ll start right… Here” he said as he stabbed Ian in the side, going in very deep. Ian let out a loud scream. Mickey froze in horror as he watched the blood pour out of his wound. That was just the beginning. The masked man continued to tortured Ian. Stabbing him in multiple places, slicing through his skin, cutting off three of his toes and four fingers. Finishing with cutting off one of his ears. Mickey begged and pleaded for him to stop. Threatening and screaming. All while tears poured from his eyes. Screaming to let him go and to take him instead, no telling how many times he said stop. Yelling so much that his vocal cords would burst. Ian was in so much pain, he wished he would just die already but the sweet relief of death never came.

Finally, the man stopped. He put his tools down and walked over to Mickey.

“I think your right. We’ll stop.” A small wave of relief came over Mickey.

“We should just put him out of his misery” He said as he pulled out a gun. Mickey looked at the man in pure horror. The man looked at Ian and then back at Mickey. “On second thought, why don’t you do it” He said as he started to untie one of his hands.

“You can fuckin torture me all you want but I’ll never do that. I’d rather die”

“It’s ok” He gripped Mickeys hand. It was scary how strong he was. Mickey could barely move his hand. “I’ll help.” He wrapped Mickeys hand around the gun and put his finger on the trigger. Ian, barely conscious, looked up, tears streaming down his face. Mickeys eyes started to tear.

“Don’t make me do this.” He said sobbing

“No son of mine is going to be a dick sucking faggot.” Mickey looked at the man. What was once a faceless white mask was now his father. He started to press mickeys finger agents the trigger.

“Dad no don’t make me do this, please stop.” He cried but terry wasn’t stopping. Mickey begged and pleaded but terry kept pressing down on his finger, and then

BOOM!

Mickey shot up from his bed, breathing as if he had just run ten miles. He looked around. He was back in his room. Ian sat up.

“Hey you ok?” Mickey looked over at Ian. His eyes went wide. He quickly lifted Ian’s shirt, looking for stab wounds, grabbing his hands and examining them to make sure he had all ten fingers, and the checking the side of his head to make sure he still had his ear.

“Hey what are you doing” He looked at his boyfriend with a smile. Mickey started to tear up and his breathing wasn’t slowing down. Ian’s smile faded “Are you ok? What’s wrong?” He said concerned. Mickey looked into his boyfriend’s eyes and started to cry. He wrapped his arms around Ian and pressed his face into Ian’s chest.

This took Ian by surprise. Mickey had never done this before.

Mickey cried harder. The trauma he was experiencing was intense. Almost painful. He had never felt this kind of pain before

“Mickey you have to calm down.” Ian frantically tried to think of something that would calm him down. That’s when a memory appeared in his head. Ian took a breath....... and started to sing.

“When it rain it pours but you didn't even notice It ain't rainin' anymore, it's hard to breathe when all we know is The struggle of staying above, the rising water line” Ian sang. His voice soft and soothing.

“Well the sky is finally open, the rain and wind stopped blowin' But you're stuck out in the same old storm again You hold tight to your umbrella, darlin' I'm just tryin' to tell ya That there's always been a rainbow hangin' over your head” Mickey listened. His crying became softer and his breathing started to slow. As he sang, Ian rubbed Mickeys back, trying to calm him down as much as possible.

“If you could see what I see, you'd be blinded by the colours Yellow, red and orange and green, and at least a million others So tie up your bow, take off your coat and take a look around” They both slowly laid back down. Mickey had stopped crying and started to focus on Ian’s voice. His breathing returning to normal.

“Cause the sky is finally open, the rain and wind stopped blown' But you're stuck out in the same old storm again You hold tight to your umbrella, darlin' I'm just tryin' to tell ya That there's always been a rainbow hangin' over your head” With every word Ian sang, Mickey felt better. His body getting more relaxed by the second. He closed his eyes and listened.

“Oh tie up your bow, take off your coat and take a look around Everything is alright now” Mickey began to drift back to sleep.

“Cause the sky is finally open, the rain and wind stopped blowin' But you're stuck out in the same old storm again Let go of your umbrella, darlin' I'm just tryin' to tell ya That there's always been a rainbow hangin' over your head Yeah there's always been a rainbow hangin' over your head It all be alright” Ian’s voice fading as he finished the song. He looked down. Mickey was fast asleep. He let out a sigh of relief and went back to sleep.

……….

Ian sat next to a sleeping Mickey, gently rubbing his head. He looked at his phone. 11:30am. Thank god neither of them had to work today. Mickey groaned, he was finally waking up.

“Morning.” He said in a sleepy voice.

“Morning.” Ian said back. Mickey got up and went to the bathroom. His bladder was about to burst. When he came back he laid his head in Ian’s lap and wrapped his arms around him.

“Hey. You wanna tell me what happened to you last night?” Ian said as he ran his fingers through mickeys soft black hair.

“Not really.”

“It’ll make you feel better. Trust me.” Mickey sighed.

“Fine.” Mickey told him everything. It stung to even talk about it. As he finished he could feel some tears forming in his eyes. He loved Ian so much, he didn’t want to lose him, even in his dreams. Ian was shocked at how awful the dream was but still sympathetic. He hugged mickey tightly.

“Don’t worry. Take a lot more than that to kill me.” Mickey huffed out a laugh. They sat in silence for a moment.

“Hey where did you learn that song from?” Ian sighed.

“Monica. When she wasn’t totally spaced out on drugs and taking her meds she was actually a decent mom and when I would have a nightmare, she would sing it to me.”

“You got a nice set of pipes”

Ian laughed a bit

“Thanks.” It was silent again. Mickey rubbed the top of Ian’s hand. Then Ian started to laugh.

“What’s so funny?” Mickey said sitting up.

“hahaha Big bad Mickey milkovich needed a lullaby to go to sleep” Ian said laughing Mickey blushed, feeling embarrassed but smiled anyway.

“Oh you think that’s funny?” Mickey said slightly laughing.

“Yes.” Ian continued to laugh

“Fuck you I’ll give you something to laugh about.” Mickey said as he started squeezing Ian’s sides and ribs, making him howl with laughter. Ian quickly fought back, going for Mickeys armpits. Mickey laughed and tried to protect himself.

They continued to play fight for a while and ended up staying in each other’s arms for the rest of the day. Mickey thought to himself

“Fuck, I’m lucky.”

End.

Notes: I hope you enjoyed reading this. I loved writing it. Sorry its long but I wanted to get it all out. Also the song Ian sang is real. If you want to listen to it (which I highly recommend) It’s “Rainbow by Kacey Musgravess”

P.S. constructive criticisms is always welcome.

#gallavich #ian gallagher #mickey milkovich #shameless

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justlostinautumn · 5 years

Text

The Assistant 11/?

Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8, Part 9, Part 10

Avengers x Reader (Fury/adopted-daughter) Bucky Barnes x Reader

A girl trying to hide her past who was adopted by Nick Fury, but cared for by Tony Stark and Pepper Potts. Being Tony’s assistant and asked to help the rest of the team. She doesn’t remember much from her past, but maybe working with this group of misfits will help knock a few memories loose and open some doors to the past. -- Sorry if this sucks!

A/N: Please send me thoughts on where you want to see this imagine go… or ideas for new stories!

Wanda, Bucky and Y/N walked back into the living room about over an hour later. A heated argument was going on in the living room as people shouted to be heard over one another.

“You can’t be allowing this?” Steve was furious.

“This is the best way to get all the information,” Nat argued.

“You don’t know that maybe she is still working for them and this is a ploy to get both Wanda and Bucky,” Sam argued.

Wanda stiffened next to Y/N as red flickered around her. Y/N grabbed Wanda’s hand and gave it a soft squeeze and they walked into the room, red not fully leaving Wanda’s eyes.

“You want me to stay here?” Y/N tilted her head, eyes giving nothing away as she stared Steve down and Bucky moved closer to her.

“Yes!” He hissed, Y/N flinched slightly but set her jaw and her eyes hardened.

“You want information and I don’t trust you to get it out of me. I’ve been here before and the last time I was almost killed. I don’t trust you.” She spoke coldly and Steve flinched at her tone.

“Your mission was to steal Bucky for your family,” Steve growled. “How can we trust you won’t take them there?”

“You think Wanda would allow me close to Barnes if that was the case? Did I forget to mention the information I was tortured for was about your beloved Winter Soldier and you lot? I would’ve died to keep the secrets I knew and you stand there saying you don’t trust me.” She snorted, her voice was getting colder by the minute.

“What do you know?” Bruce looked at her.

“Everything, the serum you made to become the Hulk, where you went wrong, Romanov’s list, Barton’s full story… the list is long and it’s not all from Nick. You really think HYDRA didn’t have files on all of you?” She looked at each one of them.

“We can’t let you leave.” Steve stepped forward. Bucky went to move forward but Y/N hand came out to stop him.

“I’d like to see you try.” She growled.

“Roger’s stand down!” Fury shouted.

“She’s a threat,” Steve shouted pointing at Y/N.

“Because I care about your best friend, or is it because he’s been more comfortable with me over my short stay than he has since he got here?” She smirks when Steve growls and charged at her. She knew she was egging him on.

Grabbing his shoulders she sprung herself over his head landing behind him dropping down and swinging her leg around causing him to fall, she quickly pounced and held him down knees pinning his hand, feet digging into his thighs and hand closed around his throat.

“Bitch!” He snarled.

“You kiss your mother with that mouth.” She pouts down at him.

“You know nothing about what he went through,” Steve shouted and she tightened her hold chocking him, people moved forward and she held her hand up indicating she wasn’t afraid to break his neck.

“No, you don’t understand but maybe could show you all? You think James is Bucky from the 40s, he isn’t! Some of you see him as the Winter Soldier from the last 70 years and I can tell you he is definitely not him. Who James is now is someone different, someone learning to live with his past, someone coming to terms with who he is, was and will be. A man who lost 70 years of his life and was controlled, who lost the basic human right of freedom. You pine for someone who died the day he fell off that train and HYDRA pulled him out of that river.” Y/N growled in Steve’s face who looked shocked and looked at Bucky who showed nothing but adoration for the girl pinning his best friend.

“He’s still Bucky, I see it!” Steve cried.

“And I still see the Winter Soldier in some of his actions, but the past is the past, you can’t live in the past Steve. All you can do is learn from it. I am not who I was when I was with HYDRA. Hell, I’m not the same lost 17-year old that Nick saved, or the girl who fell in love with Stark and Potts for showing me what unconditional love was, the girl who at 19 was Tony’s full-time babysitter and always subjected to his experiments. I’m not the girl who use to have Friday night family night with Nick and Sunday roast with him and Hill. I’m not the girl my parents raised. I was created to be a monster and maybe I am one. But, even a monster has a heart and the capacity to learn and evolve. In HYDRA I learnt from my past and from James I learnt my future, a future free from this.” Y/N spoke softly letting go of Steve’s neck and hands and was now just straddling his thighs as she watched tears streaming down his face. She looked around and saw the sad faces looking at her.

“I can show you she’s telling you the truth,” Wanda spoke up and looked at all of them and then to Y/N who nodded saying it was okay.

They were all sat in the conference room, this was a kind of venerability Y/N wasn’t sure she was ready for. But, they were right only Wanda, Bucky, Pepper and Fury trusted her 100%. Tony was on the fence, he had seen what she could do and who knew the girl before she got the majority of her memories back… but, he wasn’t sure who she was now and the rest didn’t trust her as far as they could throw her.

“Are you ready?” Wanda asked her.

“The sooner this is done, the sooner we can leave.” Y/N squeezed her and Bucky’s hand. Wanda moved behind her placing her hands on Y/N temples and projected the images out so everyone could see it all.

A gasp filled a room as images of faceless women and men scream at Y/N holding belts, knives, guns and needles. Pain filled them at each weapon they used against the girl, the sound of electrical charges filled the room as well as a blood-curdling scream causing them all to cry as they heard a child sob and beg for the pain to stop and they could hear cackling and a voice saying again. The images change, the team recognise the HYDRA base in Siberia and they see her training with the other Super Soldiers all at once, knocking them down and out without breaking a sweat. It flicks to her throwing up after eating, to them injecting her, attempting to wipe her, to her meeting Bucky for the first time.

It showed her following him around, going on missions with him, her correcting his errors in training and pushing to be the best. The image of a tender moment of Bucky cooking for her, telling her things he remembers about his past, about Steve and Brooklyn. Fear fills them all and they then suddenly feel comfort and they watch as Bucky soothes her. A warm feeling fills their chest… love. They can see her mind change, the dream of getting them out and finding someone to help. The last images were the Soldier setting her free and her begging him to come with her, the image of her running and being caught and tortured for information about everything. It showed them no matter what she wasn’t saying anything, that she wouldn’t say anything. Finally, they saw her being found by SHIELD and finding comfort in Nick, of her meeting Pepper and Tony, the feeling of admiration as she watches Tony work and happiness when she makes Pepper laugh or smile. The sense of pride when she gets Fury to admit he loves her. Then Wanda’s face appears in front of them and all they felt was the warmth family brings and finally, Bucky’s face fills the room and their hearts were about to burst with the amount of love she felt and a flicker of a memory of her taking a bullet and a stab wound for him. Of her pulling him to safety and ensuring he survived. Her sobbing when they put him in Cryo and her killing Agents who were trying to take her out of the room.

Wanda pulled away and they all stared at the girl who was now standing looking at all the tear stricken faces.

“There’s your truth.” She looked a shocked Steve.

“We didn’t know.” He said softly, blushing slightly.

“You’re an awful liar.” She sighs, “I know you saw the tapes of my training, you were angry and jealous.”

“I’m sorry,” He has the grace to look ashamed.

“Sorry is just a word, it’s like saying I promise. They both mean nothing until your actions back it up.” She spoke calmly.

“We shouldn’t have doubted you.” Clint looked down at his hands.

“It’s fine, but it doesn’t mean I’m staying here. I don’t want to be here.” She spoke slowly.

“Little One.” Nick spoke, “Go and just let me know you are okay, promise me that please.”

“I would have anyway Dad, it’s not a promise I need to make.” she smiles softly walking over to him and hugging him tightly.

“I love you Little One.” He smirks at her.

“I knew it!” She laughs and kisses his cheek.

“Come on Sestra!” Wanda smiled, throwing her arm over my shoulder.

“Wanda!” Pietro called.

“Yes?” She looked at her brother who hugged her and whispered in her ear in Russian.

“Do you still want to come?” She looked at Bucky allowing Wanda a moment to say goodbye to her twin.

“Why wouldn’t I?” Bucky tilted his head and looked her in the eye.

“Because your friends are here. I’m just some girl from the past.” She sighed frowning hating the uncertainty, she bared her soul and undying love for this man. Y/N was petrified he would reject her.

Bucky stood up looking at her and took a deep breath before he answered.

Tags:

@jay-the-mothafuckin-gay, @dark-night-sky-99, @jsmith509, @stormi-ames

#the avengers #the avengers x reader #the assistant #the avengers imagine #avengers imagine #avengers x reader #avengers #marvel imagine #bucky barnes #bucky barnes imagine #bucky barnes x reader #bucky x reader

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lisettefoix · 4 years

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INSIDE LISETTE DU POITIERS MIND - task 40 psyche.

tw misscarrige, tw childhood trauma, tw child abuse.

Lisette, as much of a wanderer as she’s always been, as a few places in her mind she dares not cross. Closed gates with roseless thorns growing around them closing in, or perhaps keeping others out, all that she would rather forget. While she will over think minuscule moments of her life down to the smallest gesture she dares not recall her time at the hospital when she was 22 and no longer pregnant or her father's handprint on her face the one time she dared to talk back to him.

Lisette’s early life was made of rules and closed-off spaces. While most royal and noble children had paths laid out for them from an early age, Lis and her brother had little more than a room. There was no room for growth in the du Poitiers house - there was simply the right way to do things. And consequences for those that did them wrong. This lead to an unhealthy focus on appearances for the young girl, and a need to be perfect in every way.

As young children they were often left alone, the only other person in the house other than their parents (in the few instances they were there) was the cook, Mrs. Carmèle, who doubled as the nanny, for Saint Croix had long blown through the family money. Mrs. Carmèle was a smiling short figure, who had to be about 70 by the time they were born and could do little else around the house other than cook. But her family had lived on the farm surrounding Château de Gudanes for as long back as anyone cared to look, generations of fathers as steward and mothers as cooks, daughters as maids or nannies and sons as valets or horseman, along with dozens of other people serving her family.

But those times were long gone, even her father barely remembering them from his own childhood. Mr. Marien, Mrs Carmèle late husband, had died when Lisette and Alphonse had barely begun school and hadn’t worked in the house since the time they learned to crawl. And so only Mrs. Carmèle lasted, singing in the early morning as she baked bread, and telling stories in the afternoon as she knitted. The children weren't happy, but those short moments - of sitting at the old wooden kitchen eating warm bread with butter weren’t the only moments Lisette and Alphonse were ever truly children. She’s the reason Lisette ever learned kindness and empathy for others, even if these layers are often masked by more prominent family traits.

The only time they were ever all four in the same place was Sunday mass. The one time they were the perfect family. For all his peculiarities Saint Croix feared god more than most mortal men. And Florence had been brought up a devout catholic so she amused her husband in this one quirk. No matter what was happening in the house they were a family on Sunday morning. Her mother’s episodes lifted, her father’s anger subsided and her and Alphonse were expected to do just the same. You left problems at the door of the church. For God sees all and will punish you for any wrong thought.

The rest of the time was filled with tutors, for no matter how poor Saint Croix got he would rather die than send his children to school. Not only for the embracement of mingling with those so far beneath them but lest it put ideas in their minds. Once they were past the basics, reading and writing and math and music, the twins were separated. Different roles called for different classes. Alphonse learned history and politics and all he needed to one day become the head of a duchy. Lisette was trusted into etiquette and learned just enough of everything to make a pleasant conversation fit for a lady. This left them both lacking terribly well into their adult years and still affects Lis to this day. She has trouble looking at facts as part of a whole instead of simply different pieces of information. Can make a coercive long term plan. Lives life on a decision by decision basis. Alphonse had a horrible time in connecting to others on a personal level analyzing every situation, no matter how close to him, as if from a stranger's perspective. While charismatic in his own way he was an awful conversationalist in everyday matters and dealt horribly with plans being changed on him. This lead to a lot of their future misunderstandings.

Their childhood was also populated by a third force, their mother. Often lasting for days, Florence would get in depressive fits that would leave her locked in her room without eating or talking to anyone, followed by short highs where she would drink herself sick. The children were not only observers to this their whole life but often active participants. Either targets of their mother's rage or little nurses, taking her to bed when she passed out drunk in the stairway, or holding her hair back as she threw up in the tub. Lisette and Alphonse would often tag team staying awake during the worst nights to make sure she didn’t stop breathing or would have to force her medication on her when she refused.

Mrs. Carmèle lasted in the house until around their 11th birthday, by then to old to be of much help. The house was still cleaned, by the faceless maids who came and went in a van and treated them like they couldn’t be touched. Perfect porcelain children. By this age they had been almost fully shaped into the adults their parents wanted them to be - one at the image of their father and one of their mother.

Despite her father's best efforts thought - Lis learns patriotism and loyalty not from his forced lessons but from her cousins in Paris. Her and Alphonse are quite a bit younger than all of them - Giselle being the closest with a 6-year difference - making it easy to idolize them. Arnauld is charismatic and smart and a gentlemen or knight of the old stories in her eyes. Benoit kind and affectionate and as she grows older a close companion. Giselle fearless with a wit to her Lis dared not imitate at home. Her sense of loyalty is still forged to that childhood sense of wonder - she will find people who exhibit traits she’s been told are valuable and hang on to them. It’s very hard to come out of Lisette’s good graces once you entered it.

Her time in Hungary leads to two things - her general happy demeanor in life & the complicated relationship with her brother. Alphonse never quite forgave her for choosing to stay in Hungary almost full time past their 15th birthday. Yet Lisette there learned to be more relaxed and carefree. She was still the perfect lady when others were looking. But to have even the short-lived conversation with Levente where she could laugh out loud or be a somewhat normal teenage girl with Fanni were worth lifetimes to Lis. The closest thing she had ever had to it where the couple of times she had visited her cousins in Belgium, Louise a greatly welcomed friend in her youth.

The times she came home Alphonse was every time further and further from the boy she knew. At the time Lisette saw it has him becoming their father, cold and distance focused simply on himself and his ever so important work, the only difference was is distaste for women. Yet as Lisette grew older and further away from her house she understood that had simply been his way to escape their childhood. She had left. He had hidden in himself.

Her marriage at first feels like a small win. She had never tried to get closer to Akos, despite her time in Hungary being dependent on it, to focused on finally having the small freedoms she was allowed. Yet she created an image of him in her mind, the perfect husband from the few not conversations they had in their “courtship”. Married life, however, proved rough from the start. Ever great at holding her fantasies Lisette couldn’t help but be thrust into real-life at every point. He was no longer charming and mysterious - they simply knew nothing of each other, and her inability to voice her concerns or wishes lead her into the depressive states she had criticized her mother for her whole life.

Her mood only lifted when she feel pregnant. Lisette thrived in the idea of motherhood. To undo all her own childhood with a new life - in her young mind just another thing to get perfect. This just made her losing the baby a bigger blow. Still incredibly religious by this point in her life the loss of her baby felt like a curse, a punishment from god himself for her sins. That’s perhaps the biggest contributor to her running away. Not only is she unable to face others as a failure (for what’s a women's job at court but to give her husband’s family children) but for a genuine belief, she’s cursed. The news she’s later to find she’s infertile don’t help this vision of herself and to this day while she’s long past seeing it as her defining feature or a curse from God, she can’t help but feel less than other women for it.

Her time in Italy gives her a small taste of confidence and opens up old memories she never dared glace over before then. Mrs. Carmèle granddaughter Sophie who was just an year older than Lisette but laughed like the song of birds was in her throat, with long gold curls down her back. She used to fancy Alphonse but Lisette would blush every time she got close to whisper secrets at her ear in the afternoon sun. Or the pretty Hungarian she had pecked one during her first year there, a game late at night with giggling girls who had yet to find consequences. A child's kiss but one Lisette could feel in her lips for days after.

Gaia was her first love, perhaps the first person who truly saw her for all but her name. Her time with the Italian is short but marks her terribly. She’s unsure to this day if she would have survived that moment in her life without it and came out the other side not being just a broken shell, like her mother.

Her travels are where she learns who herself is, without the constraints of family or consequence. She’s now truly able to find her own way in life and explore the world to the fullest. She learns how to deal with emotions - instead of simply shutting them down and how to deal with conflict instead of simply running away or pretending it doesn’t affect her. It’s not instantaneous and there are setbacks. She’s not a perfect lover nor a perfect friend and she there’s a few relationships along the way that she could never fix - her brother being one of them. But during those years does one thing she was never allowed. She tries and fails and tries once more.

Meeting Stella, and the consequent relationship she gets out of it is a breath of fresh air simply because Lis gets to experiment with it. They don’t have anything concrete for a long time but there’s an air of eternal to their connection. Their encounters at first, the spontaneity of them, make it so they don’t squash Lisette’s slowly growing spirit. Anything to fast would have sent the girl she was running at the first sight of trouble. But, whether Stella realizes it or not, the year between their first meeting and their first official date make it not only founder in Lisette’s mind but make it so she’s actually ready for that type of commitment in her life. The reason she has trouble letting go of Stella now, is because Stella was never a constant before either. Lisette had to work on bettering herself to even have a chance at happiness with another person, and that didn’t come easy so she’s incredibly attached.

Alphonse’s death drops Lis off the edge she’d been climbing once more. She’s back at square one, and closing in on herself day by day. She’s more closed off once again, yet the free spirit hangs dormant beneath. She’s more willing to trust others than she would have been in her childhood but still has trouble creating deep connections with people outside the small circle of those she trusts.

#hshqtask039 #//i didn't proof read this nor will i #if i look at it for longer it will never get posted #not tagged but if you're character is closed to lis they're probably mentioned

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